


monsoon season

by midnighters



Category: The Avengers (2012), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alternative Universe - Pacific Rim, Dubious Consent, M/M, Sibling Incest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-24
Updated: 2013-07-24
Packaged: 2017-12-21 05:54:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 24,408
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/896599
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/midnighters/pseuds/midnighters
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>they are a washed up jaegar pilot with post traumatic stress disorder, and a rookie who shouldn’t even be a jaegar pilot at all with pent up sexual longing for his older brother. together they fight monsters. or something like that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	monsoon season

**Author's Note:**

> a few notes beforehand. this is unbetaed so all grammar mistakes are mine. furthermore this is the first fic I’ve written in two years, so I’m still a little bit rusty/shaky. lastly, English isn't my first language so yeah. 
> 
> now about the fic. it’s obviously a pacific rim au, but I’ve deviated with their plot a lot. and some of the fic’s relationships/naming are based in mythology (if you’ve noticed in the movie all the kaijus had weird codenames and I kinda played with that a little bit. they’re all named after jotnar, sorry loki) also I decided to keep heimdall around because of idris elba reasons. also there's a bit of non-explicit dubcon in here. and this verse's balder has nothing in common with the comic book cutie as this is strictly inspired by the movies.
> 
> and this was inspired by marty-mc's amazing pacific rim au idea
> 
> I hope you enjoy it! critiques are very much welcome.

 

 

Loki’s less terrified of the kaiju than of Thor’s disarming smiles.

-

He winds the scarf tightly around his neck, and pulls his collar up. It is bitter cold in Alaska, where a new segment of the Wall of Life is being built, another facsimile of victory in humanity’s losing war against the kaiju.

In a dark, wool coat and slicked back hair, Loki does not look as if he belongs here; Loki never truly looks like he belongs anywhere. But he’s here now, waiting at a bar named Selvig's located on edge of the construction site, where the winds howl angry and unforgiving and a little mournful too, because he has a job that he would entrust to no one else.

Loki’s here to bring his brother back.

(Colonel Heimdall had not looked pleased when Loki had asked for this particular assignment. There had, however been an expression of surprise in those dark knowing eyes.

“I thought you did not consider him your brother,” Heimdall had said, shuffling papers and Loki only straightened up, his heart inexplicably beating rapid fast.

“I thought you said we must take whatever measures necessary to win the war.” Loki replied, quickly adding on a “Sir.”

When they were children, Thor once confided to Loki that he believed Colonel Heimdall was a smaller version of a Jaegar, terrifying and omnipotent, and if somebody ripped open his uniform, there would only be gears and bolts, and a clockwork heart, where a beating one should reside.

The memory almost made him smile; and as he turns to his commanding officer there was a glint of approval in Heimdall's eyes as he handed a file over to Loki with the words “Donald Blake” on the cover.

“Go,” he said quietly, a dismissal.)

It is a dismal day, the sky threatening rain at every turn; and Thor, normally the proverbial bull in the china shop may have just learned subtly, as he is nowhere to be seen.

Loki walks into the bar. It’s not much warmer inside.

The television is turned on, and Loki cranes his head to stare up at the screen, just as another kaiju emerges from the depths of the coasts off St. Petersburg, Russia and begins moving closer to the city, leaving a trail of waves in its wake.

It is where the first portion of the Wall of Life has been built. There is a flurry of movement as all the workers turn their heads to stare, expectant. Waiting.

The conversation in the bar stills, it’s almost silent. There’s a tension in the room, an unanswered question in everybody’s mind. Will the Wall hold up? Were their hard work and their comrades' lost lives worth it? Where their families going to be safe?

The kaiju sweeps its powerful tail. The Wall shatters, as if it is made from sugar cubes and toothpicks instead of the best steel and concrete, money can buy, sending a cloud of dust everywhere.

The kaiju has a snout like the head of a hammerhead shark’s, and a body like an elephant’s. It is impossibly slow, but strong; its lumbering movements sending shockwaves; the street becoming rubble in its wake.

The conversation in the bar starts up again.

A jaegar’s not going to be coming, Loki knows with certainty. The city’s on its own here. All the jaegars including St. Petersburg’s own Winter Widow had been decommissioned a month ago, all the pilots told to assemble in Hong Kong’s Shatterdom, a week from this date.

The jaegar program is shutting down; this is a fact.

Not enough progress, too costly, the Kaiju are adapting faster than Jaegars could be built; those are some of the main reasons, but Loki thinks privately, that maybe they've just given up.

The Jaegar used to be the brightest, most revolutionary hope for mankind ever since a scientist developed the concept after watching his children play with plastic robots. Its pilots, the superstars of this brave new world but now they’re gone – wait, there's a sudden flash of black on the screen.

A miracle happens. Winter Widow’s been carried in by aircraft, standing tall and proud, silhouetted against the sun as it beats the Kaiju down. A cheer rings out throughout the bar, as a picture of its pilots, Natasha Romanova and Bucky Barnes flash across the screen.

 _There’s no bad Jaegars,_ Bucky Barnes says in the background, there's static cracking. _Only shitty pilots. Lucky, we’re still around?_

Interviewers are now rushing to question them about their lives, about their opinions of the Jaegar program and the Wall of Life, about their families.

Jaegar pilots and their families lived two separate lives. There’s a bright veneer of interviews and loud parties but when that’s stripped away, there’s a grimier, truer reality beneath, where home is an endless line of military bases and impersonal hotels. Belongings packed in duffle bags in the middle of the night. Military rations that made Loki sick to his stomach. Commonplace deaths and much too many funerals. Loki’s father had called once called dying in battle glorious, but he had quickly changed his tone after Balder’s body disappeared into the middle of the Atlantic Ocean after a Kaiju fight gone bad.

Loki doesn’t think about it. Balder is dead, His parents are dead, the money’s gone, all gone to pay for their funerals; there’s a quiet certainty to that, a quiet dignity in having lost everything.

But that’s not exactly true.

Thor’s here. So Loki waits.

-

(When Loki was seven, he saw a kaiju for the first time.

Thor was twelve, and Balder was sixteen.

They were staying at a beach house, where Frigga and Odin, both scientists by trade, had been called to study some strange phenomenon happening near the Pacific Rim. It was monsoon season, where days could go by without the sun coming out once.

A thundercloud loomed in the distance, a flash of lightning.

All the Odinson boys crowded around the window to get a better view, as a shadow slowly rose up from the waters.

Blue-gray waves churned in the distance, their white tips rising up to meet the rain. The water surrounding the shadow suddenly turned fluorescent green as a head slowly protruded out of the water. It was reptilian, like the dinosaurs in Thor’s books, with fangs and claws.

They could hear frenetic voices in the distance, and the slow, thud of the creature's movements. The waves grew bigger. Somehow Balder got them to a storm shelter where they waited for an entire day, Thor looking pale and sick, Loki crying the entire time. 

Frigga found them the next morning; she was still in her lab coat, gray eyes shining with relief. Odin was next to her, clutching several heavy files with a grim look in his eyes. When Frigga bent to hug her boys crowding around her like puppies, her lab coat opened to reveal a hard armor like the skeleton of a bug’s.

Later Thor had dared Loki to sneak a look into Odin's files, and Loki had obliged, not wanting to disappoint his older brother. "Father's part of the Pan Pacific Defense Corps," He said proudly, his eyes taking on an expression of excitement.

"What's that?" Thor had asked, wrinkling his nose.

Loki just smiled smugly, "He's fighting aliens who come from the ocean,"

"Don't be stupid, aliens come from space! It's probably some boring sciencist thing. Come on!" 

Thor’s already running up the stairs, and Loki only ran after him, having already forgotten his retort, in his eagerness to be included.

The blonde's excited tones called, “Come on; let’s go play aliens and robots! You can be the alien!")

-

"Brother?" Loki can hear a voice in puzzled delight, and he spins around to face a figure dressed in a truly garish orange jacket, dirty blond hair spilling out of a badly knitted blue cap.

The blond starts walking up to him, until Loki could see his unshaven face. The tiny particles of ice tangled in Thor's matted hair which probably haven’t been washed in weeks.

Thor's face breaks into a grin, and for a dizzying moment, Loki feels like smiling back. He has missed the blonde.

But he doesn't. Thor's face is turned towards him, joy written all over it but he's not looking at Loki. He’s already moved on, staring at the helicopter in the distance landing down. He never looks at Loki, whose always been a constant figure dogging his shadow, searching for his approval.

Loki quenches down the feeling of warmth in his stomach and exhales, his breath turning white in the cool Alaskan air. He doesn’t realize that he’s been holding his breath. It’s a fundamental rule of the universe, truer than the sky being always blue, that with Thor, nothing else seems to matter. Like breathing.

"Hello, Thor." He replies, coldly.

It is obvious that Thor hasn’t expected that. He smiles uneasily, conceding. "Nice weather we're having.”

"Not really," Loki says, trying to convey as much displeasure and scorn in those two little words as he can.

His mouth flattens into a tight thin line. "And don't call me brother,"

It works. Thor's face falls almost comically, the light in his electric blue eyes going dark.

The contrast is almost breathtaking. Subdued, Thor looks like the hundreds of others who work on the Wall. He looks hopeless and hurt, and Loki feels a small stab of glee.

It's petty, but Loki wants to hurt Thor the way he's been hurt.

“You’ve lost the right to call me brother.” Loki adds almost inaudibility, like he’s still trying to convince himself.

There's a silence between them, punctured by the occasional argument coming from the bar's patrons, and its owner, Eric Selvig, an older looking man dressed in a faded flannel jacket. Reports had confirmed that he and a scientist named Jane Foster had been the one to find a Donald Blake lying passed out at his bar months after Thor Odinson’s ‘death’.

From the television screen, Loki can still hear the reporter's voice. "Another incident has just occurred in Miami."

Thor turns to look. Loki doesn't. "This Kaiju, which reports confirm to be a level three was able to breach the Wall of Life before being restrained by America's Agent Nomad. This is the latest in a string of incidents which leaves us wondering...just how useful the Pacific Defense Wall truly is. This is Thomas reporting live from Miami. Now back to Christopher with the weather."

Shouts ring out from the other workers, a beer can bouncing off the screen before landing a few feet in front of Loki.

"- just trying to fuckin' keep my family safe,"

"- what do you mean that the Wall's been broken - "

"...stupid meddling government..."

"Damnit." A clink of glass falling. 

" - we've been in this shitty hell for the past two years for nothing? Fuck!"

As voices ring out in displeasure and anger, several of the uniformed men materialize in the crowd, waving their batons threateningly; a voice over the intercom telling the workers to get back to work or the entire crew would no pay for the night.

It doesn’t work, if anything it only exacerbates the situation. There’s the sharp sound of chairs being pushed back, the clink of beer bottles being dropped on the floor, enraged voices rising up into a frenzy.

There's going to be a riot soon.

Thor watches with an uneasy expression; and Loki turns back to Thor and squares his shoulders.

There’s a smile on his face, as thin as a paper cut. "Mister Odinson, I am here to offer you an alternate job."

-

(When Loki was eight his father lost an eye.

It was his right eye, and it had still been there that morning glaring down disapprovingly at Thor and Loki who had snuck glue into Balder's shampoo. 

Now there's a white, sterile pad plastered where Odin's eye socket should be. Frigga helping him to his chair, her normally immaculate hair in disarray. She wasn’t smiling, talking about kaiju and jaegars and how Auntie Freyja will not longer visit them anymore.

That night Loki dreamt of monsters rising out of the ocean, Auntie Freyja falling, a world bleeding red with Odin’s eyeball where a sun should be He hadn’t realized it, but he woke up crying.

 He had wound up wandering hallways, and Thor has found him while searching for a snack and came in and rubbed circles into the younger boy’s back until Loki had fallen asleep again in the kitchen.

The next morning, Loki woke up in his own bed, with his blankets drawn over him as well as Thor's, the blonde sitting in a chair next to Loki's bed with red eyes, indicating that he didn't sleep at all.

"I was holding a vigil for you, brother." Thor said solemnly. "In case the kaijus came to take you away," he explained with gravity. Loki only rubbed his eyes.

Thor's voice lowered as he shared a secret smile with his brother.

"When I get my own jaegar," Thor started, the morning sun lighting up his golden hair like a halo. "I'll hunt all the kaiju down and slay them all!")

-

Loki wakes. This is what he knows. They are in an airplane. Thor is asleep next to him, the recycled air is stale. Thor is alive and they’re flying over the ocean en route to Hong Kong, to the last Shatterdom in the world. Thor has been drooling on his coat for the last six hours.

The blonde is still asleep beside him as they start the descent, his head leaning against the window. His neck is exposed, his fluttering pulse the only indication that he is alive.

Thor smells like snow, like engine grease and woodfires, like sweat and Loki wants to wrinkle his nose, but also to smile in relief because Thor's here, safe and with Loki, the way it should be.

Loki untangles the herringbone scarf from around his own neck and loops it around Thor with as much gentleness as he can muster. For Loki's efforts, the blonde merely grunts.

Loki convinces himself that the only reason he's doing this is so the man that Colonel Heimdall wants to see doesn't get pneumonia.

He cannot allow himself to get maudlin. Sentimental.

-

(When Loki was twelve, Thor revealed that he was going to be joining the jaegar pilots.

Odin and Frigga both looked so proud, but Loki had stormed out of the house, Thor trailing behind in his wake.

"I hate you!” Loki screamed up at him, desperately trying to get Thor's attention, because even when Thor's standing in the snow with him, Thor's thoughts are elsewhere and if Loki could just make him see, maybe Loki could also make him stay.

They were different now, and Thor no longer talked to him, the easy banter and brotherly moments of childhood disappearing as Thor grew older, and easily made new friends. Hogan, an Asian boy who was silent; Volstagg, a plump boy who liked to eat too much, and Fandral who chases after everyone with a smile. Loki had disliked them all, hating the way they took Thor's attention from him.

But even now, even though they’re not here Thor’s attentions are still turned away.

They were standing outside on the snow bank in front of their house. It was the first snow of the year, and Thor's boots squeaked in a way that used to make Loki laugh, but now just infuriated him.

 It was the perfect kind of snow; pale and encompassing. Loki had once read that in the Aleut language, there are a hundred words for snow, a fact that Loki would be trying to impress Thor with if he wasn't so angry at the blonde.

He knew that the anger was childish, and that this was to be expected. After all, Balder had left four years ago for the Jaegar Pilots.

They're both in warm, padded jackets and warm knitted scarves. Thor's was a bright red because it was his favorite color, while Loki's was a dark green that brought out his eyes according to Frigga. Balder got one too in but his violet one was still in the closet after he had declined to come home this year. He had been busy. Training.

Amidst the softly falling snow, Thor looked like an angel. He looked almost unreal, tall and broad shouldered and so very golden that Loki couldn't look away.

Loki thought that if he ever got to design and build a jaegar someday, he would call it Electric Blue and paint it in the exact color of Thor's eyes, bluer than the sky on the sunniest of mornings.

"You're gonna leave just like Balder, and you won't come back!" Loki's cheeks were flushed red from both emotion and cold.

"Let me explain," Thor called after him, murmuring useless platitudes that only infuriated Loki more.

"No! I don't need you to explain, I don't care." And before the boy knew it, his fist collided with his older brother's nose. The act was so unlike Loki, that Thor could only stare at his younger brother for a second before clutching at his nose, blood dripping onto the white snow below.

Loki's angry expression turned shocked, as he scrambled inside his pockets for the package of tissues that Frigga always made him carry in case he got a cold.

"I'm sorry," he said, frantically. "I didn't mean to do that, here just let me - I'm so sorry, brother." A babble of words came from his mouth as he pressed the sheets of tissue onto Thor's nose, a childish hope that he could staunch the bleeding if he just apologized enough.

"I really didn't mean for that to happen," Loki added, despairingly. "I just didn't want to see you go."

There was a strange expression on Thor's face. "You were not like this when Balder left," His tone wasn't accusing, just curious.

Loki stared down at his feet.

A smile swept across Thor’s face. “Are you jealous, brother? You'll be able to go to the Academy when you turn thirteen. That's just a year from now. I can talk to your teachers about placing you on the advanced track, you're an Odinson after all." He winked at Loki, who only grimaced.

Thor continued. "Or are you worried about your midterm exams? Don't worry, you don't have to see me off, you're swamped in work right now but after the exams, as soon as I can come back and visit, I'll take you skiing."

Loki grimaced, kicking up snow with his sneakers. "I hate skiing, Thor."

"You hate a lot of things,” Thor replied easily, bending down to retie Loki’s scarf.  "Come on, let's get back home. I wouldn't want my baby brother to come down with a cold right before his exam."

Loki refused to move, his fingers resolutely working to untangling Thor’s knot.

"Or is this your plan, to come down with a cold and guilt me into staying with you and nurse you back to health, because you get so prickly when you're sick that nobody else can be in the same room with you except for me." Thor tilted his head.

"Don't be ridiculous, Thor." Loki groused.

Thor clasped Loki’s fingers away from the knot. His tone was very warm. "I see it in the deepest, darkest recesses of your heart, Loki."

"Not everything revolves around you." Loki shot back as the flurries of snow began to fall, it was getting colder.

"Let's get you home," Thor's tone was soft, as he brushed his lips against Loki's forehead, before holstering Loki onto his back, Loki’s hands instinctively wrapping around his neck.

Loki looked down, petulant, his chin resting on the top of his brother’s head.

"Thor."

"Yes, Loki?"

"I'm not prickly."

Thor’s reply was affectionate, as he started walking homeward bound. "Of course you're not, little brother.")

-

Loki could never understand what is so impressive about Fandral. He's always believed that Sif would be a better bet.

Sif is impressive, she's a fast learner and clever too, with a no-nonsense attitude that can keep his brother in check. And she works harder than almost everyone. If there is anybody in Loki’s graduating class who should be paired up with Thor, it is Sif.

Loki never wants to be a jaegar pilot. Being a Jaegar pilot requires a certain kind of vulnerability, a certain openness that allows another to breach into another’s mind. It requires a certain type of trust that Loki doesn’t have.

Loki's never been an open person, he keeps to himself during meals, occasionally tolerating certain people like Bruce Banner and Tony Stark. The former doesn’t require much upkeep, the scientist usually too engrossed in his own thoughts to pay much attention to his surroundings.

Tony Stark’s an entirely different case altogether. He’s rich, entitled and a bit of an asshole and enjoys flaunting the fact his company’s basically paying for the Jaegar program in its last days. But he’s also charismatic and indulging him is the path of least resistance, and when Loki finally gives in and listens, he discovers that Tony’s actually got some good ideas. Recently however, he’s become much more mysterious talking about the motor neurons and synapse gaps of kaijus and it's fascinating stuff but Loki's been too busy worrying about Thor and hadn't been paying attention.

Thor is different from everybody Loki’s ever met. There are no reservations in him; he the friendliest person in the world, and Loki’s not just thinking that because Thor’s his brother. Thor talks to everybody, from family friends to absolute strangers, and even as Loki silently shows him to his Jaegar, the blonde still keeps up a stream of chatter, without stopping to let Loki reply, like nothing’s changed between them.

And other people are already beginning to take notice of Thor. Some of them wave, remembering the energetic, friendly blonde pilot who never had a mean bone in his body. Others look at him in curiosity as a man back from the dead. There is a magnetism about Thor like he's a whirlpool and others, including Loki, can't help but be drawn in his orbit. Thor is a perfect jaegar pilot, possessing the most important trait - the ability to trust.

Sif passes Loki in the halls already on her way to the training arena. She does not turn to look at him.

Loki has known her back when she was nearly as blonde as his brother.

Sif will make a good partner to Thor, Loki knows on an objective sense. On a subjective sense, he's vehemently opposed to the idea.

After Loki leaves Thor by his room, Loki changes quickly back into his uniform, dark shirt, baggy pants and lace up boots. He turns to go.

As he passes by Thor's room, Loki stoops down to peek into the keyhole. It’s a spur of the moment decision, and he sees a half nude Thor, clad only in boxers, whistling jauntily and unconcerned.

Loki’s hands clenched around his clipboard tightly, he’s suddenly very hard underneath his clothes.

He returns to his own room, locking the door behind him.

A thought strikes Loki like a bolt of lightning.

He wants Thor.

This isn't the first time he's wanted Thor; blonde hair and blue eyes featured prominently in his fantasies when he was a teenager.

Loki wonders if Thor's eyes will rake over his body, lighting up because he likes what he sees. If Thor would roughly push Loki up against a wall and ravage his mouth, Loki's hands pinned by Thor's as he grinds up against Thor in some hallway, Thor's mouth moaning his name.

Or maybe Thor would be gentle, his eyes roaming, categorizing Loki's body like it is a land that he wants to explore, to open him up in all the dark places Loki doesn't want to be found, and fill them with light, and kiss Loki on the base of his neck, mouth hot and wet, leaving light bruises that will show up like tattoos that Loki wouldn’t bother hiding.

Something hot and feral rises up in Loki's chest, and with quick figures, he jerks himself off with the image of Thor in his mind and after he's done, he cleans up the mess silent, running his fingers under an icy cold spigot.

He closes his eyes.

Loki is practical; he knows his limits and Thor is his brother, no matter how much he wishes that isn't true.

-

(The first time that Loki realized that he was in love with Thor was the night before Thor was to ship out for pilot training. Thor was to be gone for at least three months, possibly even longer depending on the number of recruits.

"You promise you'll come and visit?" Loki asked, suddenly small standing up against Thor who’s broad and tall, and recklessly handsome the very definition of what an Odinson should look like.

Thor nodded, and pulls his brother into an embrace. They’ve been spending more time together.

Loki only hung on tighter. "I'm going to miss you, brother."

"I'll come back as soon as I can" Thor promised, bending down to brush his lips against Loki's forehead.

There was a flush rising up on Loki’s face. The kiss shouldn’t mean anything, Thor was naturally affectionate, but it leaves Loki’s heart fluttering. In the soft morning light, Loki catches something in Thor's expression that he doesn't realize.

“I never know what you’re thinking of.” Thor said fondly, head tilted upwards towards the skies above.

Loki was thinking of textbooks that he needed to finish by tomorrow and news reports of Kaiju attacks and statistics of Jaegar pilots who never made it home. He was thinking about his parents, Frigga and Odin with a 94% compatibility rate, almost unheard of and the time they Drifted for eighteen hours. About Balder and Thor’s compatibility rating of eighty six.. He wondered what his own compatibility rate would be with Thor, and despaired of even making thirty percent.

He wondered what would have happened if Thor hadn’t kissed his cheek, but rather his lips instead. Would he have parted his mouth to allow Thor in? Would the stubble itch or tickle his chin? He shouldn’t be thinking these thoughts, he knew.

"That’s because I’m a mystery," Loki quipped, because Thor's already turned away. Because it’s a safer answer than the truth. Thor was his brother, nothing could change that. A long time ago, Loki realized that Thor was a paradox. He could be looking at Loki, listening to Loki yet he wouldn't actually look. There's a safety in that.

"Yes, you are.” Thor agreed good naturedly ruffling his hair. "I’ll bring Balder home too, I'll drag him back home even if I have to tie him up and hide him in the luggage,"

"You should probably leave a few holes in there," Loki advised, unsure if Thor was joking or not. It seemed to be something that the blonde would do. "So he can at least breathe,"

Thor laughed at that, and Loki joined in, as if nothing has changed. They’re walking through snow, passing brightly colored storefronts until they end up at the edge of their town.

They're standing in front of a rail crossing,  a train passing slowly in in front of them, carrying scrap metal and coal.

Loki could hear the sound of another train in the distance, moving closer until it passes them. He could hear the vibration of the rails, its whistle like the cry of a bird. It was moving much too fast, heading for the crossing and Loki could hear the squeak of the wheels, the sparks leaking and flying as the conductor tried to halt the train from running headlong into unmitigated disaster. The wind from the speeding trail whipping up against his hair, his scarf billowing behind.

Later, watching the sirens flash by, Loki realized that despite all of the conductor’s best efforts, the train couldn’t be stopped. He still remembered the expression of sheer terror morphing into resignation on the conductor’s face. The warmth of Thor's arms as he tried to shield Loki, a moment too late, from seeing the moment of collision.)

-

The training of a jaegar pilot is brutal, the preliminaries ruthless, with only a ten percent chance that a candidate would actually even make it to trials.

Heimdall is running the final exams, and Loki stands beside him, clipboard and pen in hand, ready for Heimdall’s dictations. He's out of the running; he forfeited his chance when he ran off to search for his brother but Loki doesn't particularly care. Loki knows that he wouldn’t have passed anyways. The trials were designed to favor those with the greatest strength, the heavy hitters.

Back in the Academy, Loki learned to fight with precision. He had also learned to fight dirty.

Thor is passionate, there’s a certain grace in his movements that almost look like he’s dancing. There’s a beauty in the ripple of his muscles as he flips another opponent onto the training mats. He’s a raw display of power.

Two years ago, he had watched Natasha Romanova spar. She was originally a ballerina before the kaiju attacked, and it showed in the precision and gravitas in her movements as she backhanded an opponent to the ground. When Loki had commented upon her skill, she had regarded him with a cool expression. Her accent had been heavy when she explained that fighting was a performance, piloting a Jaegar was a performance. People want to see explosions, to see shows of strength, she confided wryly. The Jaegars were the very epitome of humanity’s ego, they had built monsters out of steel and human ingenuity to fight monsters of nature. The Jaegars themselves were a billion dollar industry built to showcase a nation's might and a people’s pride with each nation guarding their secrets tightly.

Now the statement no longer holds true as there are six Jaegars left making up humanity’s last defense.

"Next," Heimdall's voice calls out, as Skulge’s staff falls out of his hand with a clatter.

Skulge's face falls, eyes blazing with anger, and Loki smirks as he stomps away.

"You can at least provide me a challenge," Thor's voice booms to Heimdall, tilting back his head to laugh, his voice echoing off the four walls of the arena. Thor looks golden, and Loki couldn’t help but stare. But when Thor finally catches Loki's eyes, Loki looks away.

Sif enters the ring with a nod from Heimdall in encouragement, a single minded determination in her eyes. Her dark hair is tied back in a single ponytail, her eyes sharp and focused.

The match begins.

The first time their Bo staffs connect, Thor ends sprawled on the ground, Sif's staff pointed at his chest. “You know what they say, never meet your heroes.” She says grimly.

Thor smirks up at her, pushing back a strand of his hair behind his ears. “I’m just getting started,”

"Zero-one,"

Sif begins to sweat.

Thor’s demeanor changes, it’s almost imperceptible. He’s been merely toying with the other recruits; now he might actually have to fight.

Heimdall's normally inscrutable expression turns interested.

Thor's Bo staff trips Sif, who doesn’t cry out she falls.

She’s up in a second, catching and righting herself as she stands.

“One-one,” she says.

And from then on, it's not a question of who's going to win the match.

Loki can hear Sif's heavy panting in the room, her cheeks flushed with exertion just to keep Thor at base. Sif is one of the best fighters that the Academy has trained, and there have been many times Loki has ended up battered and bruised on the mats before, without landing a single blow.

Sif turns to look at Heimdall, nodding at her older brother.

(Loki had learned of that surprising fact the first month he entered the Academy. It was getting late, and kill count scores had finally been posted. The teacher had turned to Loki with a strange expression on his face. "Well, I'll be damned." He had said, stapling the paper to the board. "You really are an Odinson."

While his tone had been mild, he had confirmed one the sentiments that had been buzzing ever since Loki got here. He had been surrounded by staff and students who wanted to look at a real Odinson, and had all left, looking like they had been all been cheated out of something after meeting Loki.

The teacher's words had been the last straw. Earlier that week a boy, Tommy Shepard, had asked "So you adopted?" It was the kind of taunting opponents threw at each other. Tommy Shepard hadn't meant it, but that line had made Loki's blood boil.

It didn’t matter, he told himself viciously, as he grabbed a visor and turned on his computer, starting another Simulation. But before he could press start, somebody pulled the visor off his face.

He turned around angrily.

"I heard what Mr. Xavier said," Sif stood behind him, blonde and unsure. She was wide eyed then, and sweet, twirling a strand of blonde hair around her finger.

Loki glared at her. "Came to tell me that you agreed with his assessment?"

"Not exactly," Sif replied softly and began telling him about her older brother without any preamble. She had carefully left his name out, until Loki had pressed. Sif revealed then laughing, that it that her older brother was Heimdall.

"But he looked so different from you," Loki said, incredulously.

Sif only shrugged and tugged on a lock of her blonde hair. "Yeah, so? You’re not exactly blonde and blue eyed and you’re still an Odinson.”

Loki clenched his hands.

She gave him an apologetic look, sensing that she had hit a sore spot.

"Alright fine, he's adopted. My father found him wandering around during the early days of the Kaiju Wars. They wanted a kid, he needed a home. And then I was born, and he got a little sister and I got a big brother. Being different didn't stop him from still being family."

That night they talked about older brothers while sharing a beer and a couple of apples ‘procured’ from the kitchens, and if Loki had room for anybody else in his heart beside Thor, they might have become friends. of course later that all changed, Sif was righteous and Loki wasn't an easy person to be friends with. But it had been nice, for a couple of months, comparing stories and talking about training and recently released movies.

Later Loki learned that he wasn’t adopted; he looked exactly like his grandmother, Bestla Buridottir, all pale with solemn dark eyes and darker hair.

But he still remembered that night.)

"Three-one,"

Sif's already tired, already worn out. There's nothing except the sound of sticks hitting against each other, everybody waiting to see what the outcome of the match would be.

"Four-one,"

Thor lowers himself to help Sif up.

"You fought well," Loki hears his brother say, voice rumbling like thunder and Sif nods, sliding out the elastic band in her hair and brushing it back again.

She suddenly stumbles, but quickly rights herself up again.

There’s an expression of pain on her face. She’s leaning heavily on her right foot. A sprained ankle perhaps.

Heimdall arrives quickly at her side, the Colonel helping the dark haired woman to a bench, a look of concern on his face.

Sif swats aside his questions with a laugh, saying that she’s just overexerted herself. Yet the expression of concern does not leave Heimdall’s face, as he offers her a water bottle. There’s look of tenderness on her as she wearily accepts from her older brother.

Thor stands in the arena, a cocky smile back on his face once he's reassured that Sif is alright. Heimdall rises up, flipping through his clipboard. The results are going to be announced, and Sif is the obvious candidate, the only one who’s managed to land a single blow on Thor.

Loki's fingernails clench into fists, and if Heimdall notices his agitation, he doesn't comment upon it. Sif will be a good for Thor, Loki reminds himself but another voice, small, selfish and bitter reminds Loki that Thor is his.

That Thor is Loki's, because Loki doesn't have anybody else.

"Wait," Loki's voice rings out, he surprises even himself with the conviction in his voice, as he tosses off his jacket, and steps into the ring. A few of the other potentials sniggers at him but Loki ignores them, gritting his teeth as he faces Thor.

Thor looks delighted when Loki picks up the bo staff lying on the ground.

"Hello, brother." Thor's grin is brighter than the sun, radiant. He's smiling at Loki, and it's a little bit heart stopping.

"Hello, Thor." Loki mutters darkly, shifting into a fighting stance, his knuckles white. He can't afford to get distracted.

There's an urgency shimmering beneath Loki's skin, a white hot coil about to snap. His breathing is even; steady as he watches Thor, an eyebrow cocked as if daring Thor to move.

They step tentatively around each other, and Thor throws the first strike. His feet pad across the practice mats, and Loki blocks, twisting away, his staff at ready.

Loki hits, the back of his staff connecting against Thor's, and Loki allows himself to up at his older brother. There’s an strange expression on his face, almost like longing.

Loki's eyes harden as he lunges, the sheer brute strength of Thor's staff suddenly upon him, jerking the ground from his feet and Loki stumbles.

Thor catches his hand, righting him back up.

"I don't need your help," he grits out. Everybody’s watching and it wouldn’t do for him to seem weak.

There's a flash of affection in Thor's eyes that doesn't vanish at Loki's biting words. He does however, look chastened. "I won't help you next time, then.

"One-zero," Heimdall calls placidly.

They continue to circle each other, searching for openings. Loki strikes, and Thor blocks. Thor parries, and Loki dodges. There's a naturalness to Thor's movements now, fluid and beautiful and that's one of the things Loki admires about his brother, Thor's completely unpredictable like a force of nature.

Loki lunges, jabs and swings. They're elementary, standard drills that Loki's been taught from the very beginning but ones he can trust--the muscle memory rote--as he searches for an opening, any opening. Thor dodges and blocks flawlessly, there's a sheer passion to his fight. Thor has strength, but Loki’s fast, all sleeksilver and swift.

In the slip-second Loki looks up, he realizes Heimdall's no longer watching the match. He's typing something in his handheld computer. And in the moment that Loki’s distracted, Thor brings him down onto his knees.

"Three-zero,"

Loki smirks, flipping back onto his feet. Thor is ready with an attack, his bo staff ready but he's not the only one prepared. Loki lunges and Thor deflects, but before Loki tips over, he charges forward, using that momentum to push Thor to the ground, his bo staff pointed at Thor's throat, eyes cold.

He's breathing heavily, sweat trailing thin lines down his neck. He realizes he's straddling Thor, but he doesn't move. The room is completely silent.

"Three-one,"

There's no cheering in the room, all eyes fixed upon Loki who still doesn't move. His legs feel like leaden weights, and as he stares down at Thor, he could see his brother's eyes, deep pools of blue that Loki could drown in.

Heimdall strides into the center of the room. "I've seen enough," his voice is quiet, commanding as all eyes shift towards him.

"Balder used to kick my ass all the time," Thor whispers, smiling up at Loki with that infuriating grin, and Loki feels the corners of his lips lift up, a wave of affection rising up in his chest.

"I've made my decision,"  Heimdall says, and Loki could hear his own heart thudding against his chest. He can’t tell if Heimdall’s furious at him or if it’s something else. It's going to be Sif, he knows with a frightening certainty, a feeling of loss.

"The pilots for Mjolnir Frost will be Thor Odinson..."

Thor's still grinning up at him, an expression of pride on his face. Any second now, Loki will stand up and straighten himself, any second now Loki will walk up to Sif, a thin smile on his face as he offers congratulations. He's not sure what to so.

Any second now.

Heimdall's voice rings with finality. "...And Loki Odinson,"

It is silent. There are dumbstruck expressions across the room. A few unbelieving sniggers in the back. Sif smiling ruefully at him, before turning around and walking out. She’s not happy.

Even Thor looks thunderstruck.

 Loki only blinks.

"If you will excuse me," Heimdall heads for the door and the crowd follows him, leaving Loki very much alone with his brother.

 -

(Loki was three days away from turning thirteen when he saw his brothers take down their first Kaiju. The lazy afternoon light filtered through the windows of the cafe, the weather warm and the sky, blue. Other students were lounging or studying, finishing the last of their projects and assignments before the summer malaise hits.

There were only three channels on the television now; a channel playing old movies, a talk show, and the news; and like everybody else, the proprietor of the café, Roskva had the channel turned to the news.

Roskva was a plump, smiling woman who lived in the apartment above her café after her home was destroyed by a kaiju. She was pleasant and kind and gave Loki free coffee in exchange for his stories about his brothers, each more outrageous than the next.

Loki had become quite adept at lying, it was a challenge to see how far he could lead them on before they got angry at him. People were hungry for news, and Loki happily provided them lies, grand adventures about three headed Kaijus with five hearts that his mother singlehandedly fought. That his father fought. That Thor and Balder fought. He never kept his stories straight, it was fun in a sense, to continue the myth.

Roskva was different, she saw through every single one, but encouraged him anyways. They weren't lies, not exactly, she proclaimed, but rather stories, and had urged Loki to consider a career in writing.

That afternoon, just as the clock struck three, Roskva swept towards him, her coffee cup in hand. The television was on. "That Jaegar looks familiar," she said, more to herself. Loki looks up, staring at the distinctive red and silver colors of his brother's Jaegar, blood running cold.

"That's my brothers' Jaegar," Loki said, his heart pounding against his chest, before standing up, as the Kaiju grappled Mjolnir Frost into the water.

First time fatalities are thirty two point three nine percent, he remembered, from one of his lessons, his heart being so hard, so fast. First time fatalities are thirty two percent.

His mind went blank, as Mjolnir Frost goes down.

"Don't you want to cheer on your brothers?" She asked kindly.

Loki blinked at her. "What's there to cheer for?"

"That," she replied, pointing upwards.

On screen, Mjolnir Frost had righted itself back again. There was a dent in its hull, and scratches upon its body, but everything seemed to be working.

The Kaiju was a level three, the first level three ever to be seen, Class Description, Thrymr with arachnoid legs bristling with hairs and bright, red eyes scanning the horizon. It was bluish gray with trunk-like legs.

Mjolnir Frost raised its arms together before slamming it down onto the Kaiju's head, a thunderous cheer emerging from the cafe.

The Kaiju seemed disoriented and seizing the moment, Mjolnir Frost retracted its left hand as a hammer-like appendage formed, quickly powering up and then releasing a bolt of silver as bright as lightning, ripping the head of the Kaiju off, entrails flying into the water.

"Thor was always so messy," Loki confided in Roskva, but he had been impressed.

The headless Kaiju toppled over with a splash,  a tsunami sized wave of water rising up in its wake; as Mjolnir Frost turned to walk slowly back into the Shatterdom, as an even louder cheer rose in the cafe.

The large wave hit the shore with a roar, engulfing the debris in its watery embrace, dragging it back into the water, leaving behind an empty shore.

That final detail was the one that Loki remembered, the water clearing the broken buildings away, leaving behind nothing but an expanse of white.)

-

The worst part of it was that it is Thor who contests the decision.

For the briefest of seconds, Loki actually considers what it would be like to be Thor's partner. To get lost in the vastness of Thor's mind. To have Thor peer into Loki's deepest thoughts and proclaim that it doesn't matter, because Thor loves Loki anyways.

But Loki knows that those dream are but brief daydreams, fanciful fallacious, and most importantly impossible.

Thor was bright and shining, a paradigm of everything good who would hate Loki, if he sees Loki for what he really was - something disgusting like a worm or a kaiju and Loki would be shut out from Thor forever.

The world's changing, gay relationships have become more accepted, the moral guardians concerned with more important things now, like trying to stay and keep their families alive, but there are still lines that normal people don’t cross, and incest is one of them.

To be honest, Loki's not even sure Thor's gay.

A few days ago, when Loki has asked, about the hideous blue cap Thor had been wearing, Thor has only replied that it was a gift from a very smart and wonderful lady named Jane Foster.

Loki couldn't be Thor's co-pilot. He doesn't even want to be Thor's brother, it's a feeling that's dizzying, nonsensical and crazy. He couldn’t be Thor’s co-pilot, they shouldn’t co-pilot a Jaegar together. They can’t.

And it's petty, Loki knows but he wanted to be the one who protests first. He has the scenario all planned out in his head, Thor would duck his head and pretend to look all shy, but then a bone deep pride would stand out in a voice, as he would say, voice rough, that they would make good partners. And he would look at him, truly look at Loki and smile.

An Loki would only shake his head, demurring that he wasn't worthy and implore Thor, for his sake, to choose a new partner, sarcastically of course, before walking out the room, ignoring the look of abject betrayal on Thor’s face.

Loki wants to be the one who abandoned Thor, to abandon Thor to the same suffering that he had been put through.

"I forbid it," Thor whirls upon him, the blonde’s words sounding like a door closing on Loki's face, a hammer striking apart his heart. "There must be some kind of mistake."

A vein of white hot anger races through Loki's body. "What do you mean?" Loki asks; he feels as if he's standing on the edge of a great precipice, one wrong move and he would fall and there would be no one to catch him.

Thor's voice is brittle. "I won't pilot a Jaegar with you,"

"I found you, and I brought you back." Loki stares eye to eye with his brother, a cold fury rising up in his voice. "I found you carving out a life in waste and hopelessness, I brought you back. I didn't give up on you, so now you're going to turn you back upon me? I brought you back,"

A cold chuckle rises up in Loki's throat.

He flew to the coldest edges of the world for Thor. It's always been Thor. Always ever only been Thor. There's a name for this kind of loyalty, to love somebody so much that it turns to hate, that turns to anger and absolute frustration because Thor doesn't see, Thor never sees. And Thor doesn't know, couldn't know what Loki would do for him.

He continues. "I see now, the mighty Thor doesn't wish to pilot his ship with his weak, little, baby brother.

"You're hardly weak, Loki."

His voice rises. "Or is it that I'm still your little brother that you couldn't stand to see get hurt, is that it? I'm no longer twelve now, I'm twenty if you haven't realized. I'm taller than you are, I have better grades than anybody else in the academy, a kill sheet only second to yours. I'm worked hard, so tell me Thor. Why?"

Thor remains silent.

"Tell me!" The last part is a shout, his words hitting a crescendo.

Thor's never been very good with words, he's struggling for a reply. "A-after Balder, I just can't have anyone else in my head again" His voice softens. "I'm impulsive and rash, I'm very bad at following orders. I can get you killed."

"I can take care of myself, Thor."

"I don't doubt that. Father -"

"Oh, so this is about father isn't it? He should be grateful to have a son looking out for him, so that his legacy wouldn't be tarnished. He must be proud to have a son who worries for them, who looks out for them, even after they're dead."

"Don't be selfish, brother."

Thor suddenly realizes that this is the wrong thing to say as Loki explodes. "Don't be selfish? Selfish like who, like you? You packed up and left, leaving me to hold mother's hand during the funeral for both her sons. You left, leaving mother and father to grieve. I had to endure father telling me not to be ridiculous when I told them that you would come back. For months they said I was crazy because I said you would come back. A-after the funeral for both their sons! And yet you call me selfish? You're a hypocrite!"

"I'm sorry," Thor says, body sagging down in defeat.

Loki wants to hate him. Thor should be hateable, he's everything that Loki ever wants and wanted to be, he's too confident and brazen, he takes everything in stride, and lives in the moment, abandoning caution to the winds. Thor's too open with his heart and expects everybody else to be too, he snores and makes messes and shows up perpetually twenty minutes late to everything. And he ruins everything, every ounce of victory that Loki revels after seeing Thor slumped, dissipates, leaving him hollow and empty.

Maybe in a different world somewhere, a world devoid of Kaijus, Thor and Loki would be eating breakfast together and Thor would ruffle Loki's hair and ask about his classes before going off to work himself. Maybe in a different world somewhere, Thor would be a superhero, and Loki, his biggest fan.

"I only ever wanted to be your equal," Loki finishes miserably.

There’s a silence in the room. Thor doesn’t say a word.

Loki nods, acquiescing. "I'll talk to Heimdall,"

-

He leaves Thor and heads to Colonel Heimdall's office. Inside, the Colonel sits, typing away at a memo to his superiors. In the wan light of the night, Colonel Heimdall looks tired and old, but then again, everybody looks tired and old; they’re all waiting for something, for anything to happen.

There’s the sound of falling rain, pattering against the window.

“I know why you’re here,” Heimdall says, eyes still fixed upon the bright, blue glare of the computer screen. “After I have made my decision, your brother tried to convince me otherwise. He was rather ah, shall we say forceful?”

“I apologize for Thor's actions. He doesn't think anything through, sir." Loki quickly replies, hands clasped behind his back.

Colonel Heimdall clears his throat. “I’m sorry,” he says. “My decision stands. We are in the midst of a war, and I do not have time to play counselor between two brothers. Whatever issues the two of you may have, you must work them out on your own time.

As Loki’s walking out of the room, Colonel Heimdall sighs.

“I saw something back there.” He says. “It’s the single-minded determination that both of you share. I’m not sure you’re aware of this, Mr. Odinson, but the end of the world’s coming. We’re trying to fight it, and if you and your brother could spare a moment from pulling each others’ pigtails, we’d really appreciate your help.”

“Yes, sir.” There’s a mutinous tone in Loki’s voice that Colonel Heimdall catches.

“Do you know who has the highest compatibility in the Jaegar Program?” The dark skinned man asks mildly.

“My parents, sir.” Loki responds. “Or Romanova and Barnes.”

Colonel Heimdall walks over to him, handing him a slip of paper with a number highlighted in bright yellow with their names printed upon it. Loki takes it in confusion.

The man strides past him. “Not anymore,” he calls.

After Colonel Heimdall leaves, Loki opens the paper and smoothes out the sides. There’s aptitude test scores, Loki’s pleased that he beat Thor in strategy, and engineering, and less so when he sees Thor’s scores in strength and agility.

Finally he turns his eyes to the bottom of the page.

“Thor Odinson and Loki Odinson

Compatibility: 99.1%”

That’s not possible. Loki’s turns to go when he spots something blonde in the corner of his eyes.

"Brother," Thor stands in half shadows, having followed him in seconds after. "Can I show you something?"

Loki just nods, suddenly unsure.

There's the ghost of a smile on Thor's face as he walks over to a lever half hidden in the darkness.

There's the strain of metal sliding upwards, creaky and sad revealing floor to ceiling windows. Loki sits on the ground and surveys the city spread out before him.

Hong Kong is a sprawling metropolis, all bright neon lights, concrete and glass. As locations go, it's not a bad place for humanity's final stand.

Loki's eyes land on the broken buildings beneath him, jutting out of the ground like a Kaiju's teeth and he breathes in the sea salt air mixed in with smoke and rain and a hundred different other smells. It's cold tonight, and Loki looks out at the ocean blending so seamlessly with the sky that he cannot tell where the ocean ends and the sky begins.

There's a staggering feeling of loss in his chest.

"Heimdall told you our results didn't he?" Thor asks softly.

Loki nods, retrieving the white slip of paper and handing it over to Thor like a peace offering. "Yeah,”

"We're 99.1 percent compatibility," It’s just numbers, Loki tells himself. But there's a spark of hope in his chest.

Thor just whistles.

Loki shrugs. "Stranger things have happened,”

High above, he can hear the light rumble of thunder, and Loki closes his eyes as something hot and wet falls onto his cheeks.

"Loki?" Thor asks, sitting down next to him. He’s very close.

"Yeah?"

"I was thinking about what you said back there. About us being equals. I’ve never thought of you any less.” Loki just glares at him, and Thor’s face furrows. “D'you want to give it a try? I mean us. As co-pilots." There’s a strange expression on Thor’s face. “We could be good together.”

Maybe it's because Loki couldn't refuse Thor anything, and maybe it's because Loki loses his mind in the next five minutes forgetting about all the stakes involved, and just content to sit next to his brother; his head resting against Thor's shoulder. Thor staring at Loki like he's something special, like he's always been something special.

Loki sighs. "Alright, brother.”

-

("What's the Drift like?" Loki once asked Balder.

Balder seemed startled at being addressed, as he pulls on his bomber jacket.

There’s an expression of pity in his eyes. "Never go into somebody else's head without being prepared for what's inside it.")

-

He is falling.

_Initiating Neural Handshake._

_In three._

_Two._

_One._

Loki's mind is suddenly hit with a wrecking ball of memories and glimpses into Thor's life, Thor's experiences with him growing up, Thor's travels to Alaska, Thor spending time with a pretty scientist working on Einstein-Rosen bridges. He sees memories from when they were boys, running down long corridors. Balder always winning.

He sees a empty beach, the wreckage of Mjolnir Frost, a bone dry terror in his chest as Balder's carried up into the air, his screams making oddly little discordance with the thrashing waves below.

Suddenly a storm hits, and Loki clings to the wreckage of the Jaegar. As the tide starts pulling him away, Loki only clings on tighter as the water rises up, submerging him in the deluge.

 _You need to let go,_  a voice shouts in his head, insistent and desperate.  _You need to let me in! Loki, I can't access your memories._

He's falling.

And then darkness.

And the migraines come, Loki's clutching his forehead, there's an intruder in his brain, a foreign virus attacking the circuitry of his brain, something that shouldn't be there. He tugs off his helmet, the metal headpiece clattering against the floor.

"Please," he whispers, clutching his head as he opens his eyes. Somebody's arms are wrapped against him, something solid and he clings on, bumping his nose against the hard metal of Thor's pilot suit.

He's crumbling, sobbing and he doesn’t know why. He feels like somebody's stuck a red hot poker into his brain. "I don't want you in my mind," he grits out.

He's falling again, and he grasps the only thing solid he could find. His nose is bleeding.

 _Neural handshake failed,_  a female's voice serenely tells them.  _Would you care to try again?_

Thor's kneeling down next to him, Loki's vision changes and he realizes that Thor's picking him up, and Loki's head rests on the strong line of Thor's shoulder, large hands supporting him as he's carried away from the testing site.

The last thing Loki remembers is the bone dry terror that he felt – that Thor felt, the sheer helplessness of watching ones own brother die in front of them.

-

Sif's already in the training area when he arrives. She doesn't acknowledge him. He's pretty sure that she's still angry.

"The neural connection failed," he says, grabbing a staff from the racks. He turns to a practice straw dummy and hits down on it, arms ramrod straight.

There is the sharp sound of stick hitting straw. "Oh, really?" Sif asks, her voice is sharp.

Loki nods, and finds his own straw dummy to hit. "Yeah,"

Sif's stick clatters to the ground. "Knew the two of you were a mistake," Loki does not mistake the venom in her voice.

She leaves.

-

The second time’s not much better.

-

"I heard the two of you had problems again," Sif says, almost conversationally the next time they meet in the arena, her eyes looking intently ahead. "What's your compatibility rating anyways?"

"Ninety-nine percent," Loki replies.

Sif laughs. "That's impossible."

"Nope," Loki's laugh is hallow and bitter. "Think they'll figure out their mistake and replace me? With you?"

She doesn’t apologize, even though Loki could see the apology in her eyes. He knows how hard she’s worked for this, to be able to pilot a Jaegar. He doesn’t blame her for hating him, after everything he’s ever done to her. Sif's staff sails towards him in an arc, and he blocks it, the two of them both shifting into fighting stances.

Loki loses again that night. He’s sore.

-

He’s falling again.

“You need to relax,” Thor says before the third trial. “You mustn’t think I’ll judge whatever’s in your mind.”

But that’s exactly the problem, Loki knows, closing his eyes as the signal for the Neural Handshake turns on. He feels like he’s drowning as the orange liquid washes over his face, and he takes a deep breath when the helmet fills with air again.

He braces himself for impact.

_In three._

_Two._

_One._

This time he’s in the ocean again, clinging to the shore. He pulls away, and lets himself fall.

This time Loki’s traveling back into his own memories, he’s twenty and he’s kissing Leah Hel, he’s walking to the podium to receive his diploma and it’s Roskva who gives him a warm hug afterwards. He’s falling backwards again, Drifting from his mind to Thor’s as their memories begin to converge.

He’s playing with Thor in the garden when they were kids and suddenly the memory changes to when he’s just turned twenty and Colonel Heimdall pulls him out of class to tell him that his brother is alive.

Things go dark again, when he’s suddenly jerked into the opposite direction, thoughts whipping past him, and he finds himself in a Jaegar. It’s bitterly cold, flurries of snow falling, tangling in his hair.

The place looks familiar, they’re surrounded by mountains and fjords and Loki thinks that it would be beautiful except for the Kaiju charging at them.

Somehow he knows already the type, it’s a Category Four and he’s gripping the controls, flicking up the switches to power up the blaster, Thor copying his movements. They're synchronized through the Drift in a way that Thor and Loki has never b- Wait.There’s an oddness about this scene, muscle memory in Loki’s arms that he never remembers learning.

“Ready, Balder?” Thor asks, grinning at him and Loki's breath hitches.

They’re not fighting a Kaiju, they’ve never managed to even successfully power a jaegar before. And realization suddenly hits him.

This is a memory.

He’s inside Thor’s head, reliving a memory.

The distant voices grow louder, more insistent, something’s wavers but Thor doesn’t notice it, can’t notices it as he’s too busy manning the controls. He glances over to Loki, a grin over his face.

“Ready to kick some Kaiju ass?” Thor asked, his hand outstretched, as the cannon powers up. There's a cracking sound high above, it's distant but it makes Loki's heart go cold.

“Wait," Loki says, blinking. "This is not real.”

“What do you mean?” There’s a frown of confusion, of puzzlement on Thor’s face. To him it must be real, it's already happened, and watching the Kaiju as it sped faster towards them, Loki's shouting -

“This – this isn’t real, it’s all just a memory.”

It feels real enough, the sea spray and rain water hitting his visor, making it difficult to see. A storm's beginning.

Thor’s arms are still outstretched, the blast growing bigger until Loki reaches over, and wretches his arm down.

“This isn’t real.” Loki says, just as the Kaiju’s claws reach for him, pulling him out of the cockpit –

– and suddenly Thor looks like a man waking up from a nightmare, face frozen with terror, as he reaches for Loki. Loki feels the wind whipping against his hair, the realization that he’s going to die, he's resigned and terrified at the same time – these aren’t his memories, these aren’t even Thor’s memories, but memories of -

“Balder!” Thor’s shouting, and Thor’s face looks wracked and devastated, lit up by lightning, a laceration on his nose, bruises on his skin looking sickly yellow and mottled green.

The storm grows stronger, rain pelting harshly against Loki’s face.

There's a cackle of electricity coming from very far away.

He’s flying, free falling, is there really a difference? He’s not going to make it - there is a saying that if you die in a dream, you wake up. You wake up.

What happens when you die in a memory?

When Loki wakes again, he’s slumped against the back of his cockpit, next to Thor whose still frozen, like he's in a trance.

Thor’s turns his head slowly to look at Loki, as if he’s seen a ghost. “That was my last memory of Balder. The Kaiju picked him up, and flung him and I was alone. I fought the Kaiju, alone – ” His voice drifts off.

_Initiating Neural Handshake._

Thor's voice hitches. "I'm all alone now,"

“No, Thor.” Loki whispers, unsure. “I’m here,”

Thor tries to smile but it’s such a small, broken thing. Loki’s movements are unsure as he opens his arms and pulls Thor into an embrace, clings to Thor tightly, voice breathless.

“I’m here brother, I’ll always be here."

_Neural bridge establi - Neural Handshake failed due to system shutdown. Would you like to try again?_

-

(When Loki was twelve, he entered the Academy.

The Academy was built by the government to train a new generation of students. In addition to regular subjects, such as mathematics and grammar, students were trained to fight and trained to build.

There was a common saying at the time, in order to fight monsters, we created monsters and it referred to the Jaegars, monsters of metal sent out to destroy but could apply to people. War brought out both the best and worst in people, and for many of the students at the Academy, it brought out a crueler side to them, adolescents given too much power and responsibility and expectation, without common sense.

The first time Loki sat foot into the school, he was too short and too smart, the perfect target for the larger boys to bully. "This group is for the talented, not for little boys whose daddies got them in." One of the larger boys said, his name was Theoric, a tall gangly boy of fourteen with a wicked smirk on his face.

Loki merely shrugged. "Maybe you're the one who shouldn't be here then,"

It earned him a laugh and an approving gaze from the blonde haired girl standing by the corner.

“I’m just saying,” Theoric said leisurely, leaning close to Loki, his spittle hitting Loki’s cheek “Your brothers and father aren’t here to defend you. You sure you can hold your own?”

“That just depends on how bad everybody else is. If they’re all like you – ” Loki shrugged. “- well there’s no trouble at all.”

Theoric threw Loki against the wall.

Loki’s bit his lips to keep from screaming, his elbow jabbing into Theoric’s solar plexus and within seconds Theoric’s on the ground gasping for breath. It had been luck, and he had stood there, shaken with a bloody lip.

“What is going on?” A man asked, clear and forceful. He was clad in a military uniform, and all the boys froze.

One of Theoric’s friends, Bragi spat. “Loki attacked Theoric.”

“And did you, Loki?” The man asked. He was tall, dark skinned and had an almost commanding air about him. Later Loki will known him as Colonel Heimdall.

Loki didn’t reply.

The man turned towards the blonde haired girl. “Sif?”

Sif raised her head. “Colonel, Loki did attack Theoric, but Theoric provoked him.”

“I don’t want any fights. Save it for the training arena, boys. And Loki, Theoric – ” The man heavily frowned. “Don’t expect any preferal treatment, if anything like this happens again, you will be sent home. Understood?”

A week later, Loki paid for his attack by getting ambushed in the training arena. It wasn’t that he couldn’t fight back, the other boys had extra pounds of muscle on them that he didn’t have. He was plummeted with fists until he could barely see, and left there because he could hardly walk.

He remembered waking up in the hospital room, his head spinning and eyes swollen to be met with Thor’s expression, half exasperated and half worried. He looks like he hasn’t slept for a week, dark shadows underneath his eyes. The glare of the lights above the hospital room illuminated the large bruise on Thor’s cheek. He had just fought his third Kaiju with Balder only a few days ago.

“You really must start taking care of yourself,” Loki admonished weakly, earning a smile from Thor.

“Speak for yourself, brother. What happened? Did you really get into a fight?

“I don’t like it here, Thor.” He confessed. “I’m good at Sims but once we actually start sparring, I always lose. And the other kids always laugh and say that an Odinson shouldn’t be this bad.” He made a face.

“I didn’t do so well in my first year either,” Thor’s voice is unbearably fond as he presses a cool cloth on Loki’s forehead It’s a lie, and there was a expression of pity on Thor’s face that Loki didn’t like.

He changes the subject. “What’s it like being in a jaegar? Is it worth it? The countless drills? The gross food?”

That earned him a laugh from Thor. “You want to know a secret?”

“Oh?”

“The food really doesn’t get any better.”

Loki laughed.

Thor sobered up. “But it’s worth it. Being in a jaegar’s like…you know, there's things that you can't fight. Acts of god or whatever. Like you see a hurricane coming, you just have to get out of the way, you know? But when you're in a Jaeger, suddenly you can fight the hurricane - and you can win.”

“But what if I can’t win?”

“Of course you can win, Loki. You might not be as large or strong as the other boys, but they’re all older than you, and there’s no smarter student with better grades than you. And should worst come to worst, Loki – ”

“I could always run. I’m faster than they are.”

“No, Loki. Don’t run. Outsmart them.”

It works better in theory than in practice. Loki doesn’t tell Thor that.)

- 

Loki opens his eyes. It takes a few moments to remember who he is, the first few seconds of consciousness disorientating and lonely after somebody’s been in his mind. He allows himself to calm down, his heartbeat to resume their regular rhythm, as he watches Thor shrug out of the harness.

Heimdall looks furious, but he says nothing.

They’re taken off their shift. Loki considers them lucky to be let off so easily.

-

Loki drifts in and out of consciousness in the next twenty four hours.

There’s something wrong with him, with them both. They are a washed up jaegar pilot with post traumatic stress disorder, and a rookie who shouldn’t even be a jaegar pilot at all with pent up sexual longing for his older brother. Together they fight monsters. Or something like that. There’s been a colossal fuck up somewhere in the computers and the moment things are fixed, they'll get another pilot to replace him because Thor’s invaluable and Loki’s not sure what will happen to himself.

Loki’s too tired to think about anything or anybody. Ninety nine point one percent. Like that’s even possible.

Sif arrives a few times. She leaves a bouquet of white tulips and hyacinths on Loki's dresser before walking out. An apology. Loki's starting to wonder if they’ve already  replaced him with her, and the feeling is so terrible that he throws her flowers against a wall, watching with a vicious satisfaction as its petals scatter.

When Loki hears a knock on his door, he throws a book at it. “If you're Sif, I don't want your apologies. If you’re Thor, don’t bother coming in.  If you’re not Thor or Sif, don’t bother coming in either.”

“This is Bruce Banner.” The calm voice replied dryly. “I’m restraining Tony from barging into your door right now. We were wondering if you’d like to get drinks. Tony thinks we’ve made a breakthrough.”

The door suddenly un-clicks, and opens, Tony Stark striding in with a bright grin that only makes Loki’s head hurt.

“We are going to get drinks that you my dear friend, will not be paying for.” Tony’s voice is loud, exacerbating Loki’s headache, as the other brunet pulls the blanket off Loki, who just groans and buries his face in his pillow. “Who doesn’t love free drinks?”

"Whazzahappen?" Loki mumbles.

"Bruce told you, we made a breakthrough."

Loki closes his eyes, mortified. "Shouldn't you be talking to Coulson about this?"

Bruce enters, his calm. “He’s right, if this actually is a breakthrough, we should probably get back to Coulson about this. I'm not sure why you've assembled all the pilots, they can't help us. No offense, Loki."

“None taken. Thank you Bruce,” Loki grouses, curling up in a ball. His head hurts, and he doesn’t want to deal with anybody or anything right now, but Tony Stark’s pulling him off his bed, the scientist stronger than he looks.

“Nonsense, come on” Tony says, pulling Loki to his feet and dragging him out the door still grinning with a maniacal light. “I have found the solution to your problem. And it’s not a sedative. You’ve lazed about enough on my company money. Up at 'em, pilot."

Tony drags him out where Steve, Clint, Natasha and Bucky are standing, looking equally bedraggled and rumpled. It’s about three in the morning according to the neon letters on Bucky’s watch.

“As fun as this,” Clint says dryly. “Some of us actually have to go risk out lives tomorrow. I’d really rather get some shut-eye.”

There’re all in various states of dress, Natasha and Bucky are in their uniforms, Clint’s in a pair of jeans and a violently purple sweater looking much too small for him.

“No time,” he mutters, when he catches Bucky staring with an disbelieving expression on his face. “It’s Kate’s. No, no! It’s not like that.”

Steve’s in lounge pants and a bomber jacket, next to Loki who hadn’t time to shrug anything over his pajamas.

“Field trip. Don't forget your permission slips, people. All students line up by the door. Except Loki.” Tony calls. “I need him to help me find Thor. D’you know where Thor is? Can anyone tell me where Thor is.”

Loki sighs. “I’ll show you,”

Somehow in the short time they've all been on base, Tony’s already made friends with Loki’s brother. There is something about the scientist, an gregarious quality that made people either love or hate him. In the time that Loki has known Tony Stark, he’s had invented a new cooling system for the Jaegars, learned Chinese and mapped out the complete anatomy of a Kaiju. He is brilliant, arrogant and takes up the entire room whenever he enters. He’s a Kaiju fanatic, with tattoos all over his arms, but Loki’s favorite thing about him is that he’s never met Thor, and never once asked Loki about his brother.

Except now.

Loki eyes both the door and Tony with trepidation.

“Wait here, sleeping beauty.” Tony calls to Loki as he raps three times on Thor’s door.

Within minutes, Thor opens it, wearing dark jeans and a sweater, hair wet from the showers. Loki looks at Thor, at his puffy eyes, at the tired line of his shoulder.

“Hello, brother.” Thor says, looking at Loki. He’s sleep rumpled.

Loki smiles thinly. “Want to go grab a drink? Tony's paying."

-

The streets of Hong Kong are busy, even this late in the night.

It should be dark, however all the lights are turned on. The sky’s a reddish tone. It's all much too bright. Too noisy. There's the smoky voice of a Chinese opera singer coming from a radio resting on a second story balcony, and the honks of taxi cabs in the busy thoroughfare. They navigate the precarious streets, passing a brightly lit tea house built from the bones of a Kaiju.

Tony keeps them moving, leading them through the crowded, winding streets. A whispering rain begins falling; it’s the middle of monsoon season.

Finally they enter a small exclave, dripping water and miserable.

A woman bows at them, obviously realizing Tony Stark and shows then to a small partition by the corner. Loki wrinkles his nose. It smells like smoke and alcohol and Loki just wants to go back to sleep.

Tony grins like a maniac, raising a sake cup to his mouth.

"So I have gathered all of you here today because I’ve discovered a secret. See, a week ago we learned that the Jaegar appears in intervals, but where do they come from? They're obviously not appearing from thin air."

"And?" Natasha asks, looking unamused. A bottle of vodka's materialized next to her, as well as bottles of sake around the rest of the table.

Clint takes a deep drought straight from the sake bottle. "Nauseating," he says.

"There's a very lovely scientist who Thor got in touch with me who proposed the theory of Einstein-Rosen bridges,"

"What's that?" Bucky asks, and Thor and Loki both answer at the same time.

"Wormholes."

Tony grins at them both, like a teacher who’s proud that his students have gotten the answer right. "Precisely. It's a wormhole. To an alternative dimension."

"So you dragged us out here for a lesson in science fiction?" Clint sighs, "I need to be more drunk for that. Hand over the vodka, Nat."

Natasha hands it over.

Tony watches the exchange, his smile faltering a bit. "Not exactly. Hear me out. It’s an alternative dimension where the creatures that some of you might know as kaijus reside. See, Brucie and I were studying the neurons of a Kaiju when Bruce proposed that we connect ourselves to the Kaiju -"

"-how'd you do that? Loki and Thor couldn't even access the drift." Bucky scoffs. Steve puts a warning hand on Bucky's shoulder, his eyes fixed upon Tony.

Thor bristles visibly but he remains quiet. Loki grabs the sake bottle from the table and gulps, the sweet liquid breathing life into his veins.

"I'm just saying," Bucky finishes with a grin.

Natasha places her hand on Bucky’s. "Nyet Bucky. Sit down, let's just get back to the part where Banner and Stark entered the mind of a Kaiju."

Loki sighs. It’s going to be a long night.

Tony grins. "Well, we did. Without damage to ourselves, it's a miracle yada-yada-yada but fortune does favor the brave, and it's a good thing I've got the resources like charm and fortitude -"

"-you mean money and recklessness," Loki chimes in, and Clint raises his cup at him in agreement.

“As much as I enjoy your dulcet tones Loki, we’re actually on something right now. So hush. So right, yeah we got into the Kaiju's brain. Bruce, ya wanna do the honors?"

Bruce starts, his soft voice different from Tony's raucous one. "Inside the Kaiju's mind, we saw a rift. An opening, and traveling even further, we saw a desolate world -"

"Bruce and my theory, and this is the breakthrough" Tony cuts in. "Is that they're trying to colonize our world. Their predecessors were the dinosaurs, they weren't suited to this kind of environment; they needed a world that's burnt, but not too burnt, like creme brûlée. They needed oceans filled with carbon dioxide and sulfur monoxide, they needed a toxic environment and we've practically handed it over to him on a steel platter, Stark Industries not included.”

"Why not?"

Tony grins. "Stark Industries run on green energy,"

Natasha sighs, "What are you trying to say, Tony?"

"According to my numbers and Bruce's research, the Kaijus that are attacking right now are the colonizers, the ones leading point, sniffing out our world's weaknesses, categorizing our resources. The next set of Kaijus -"

"Something tells me that they won't be as friendly," Steve says.

"Precisely right," Bruce replies, "The next set of Kaijus, based upon what we saw, will be the destroyers, they're going to decimate the world. And according to my calculations, the next time a kaiju attack happens, it's going to be a double event – "

“ – Basically the destruction and devastation of a single Kaiju. Times two.”

"So what are we going to do about it?" Bucky asks, folding his hands. "Any ideas?"

"It's a portal right?" Tony continues. "So we just destroy the portal, sever the connection,"

"And how do you propose we do that?" Loki says. "And how is that good news?"

"It's a start, the details are a little fuzzy, but the general gist of it is -" And here is where Tony says something completely ridiculous. “We build a bomb, that’s the good news.”

 “Now we just have to tell that to Agent Coulson,” Bruce sighs, like he’s not too sure of the idea ever, as he runs a hand through his unruly hair.

-

Agent Coulson is to the scientists what Colonel Heimdall is to the pilots. Both are under the leadership of Commander Fury.

Coulson is a mild mannered blonde man, and he instantly lights up the moment he sees Steve Rogers entering the room.

“Rogers saved Phil two years ago,” Natasha explains in an undertone, sounding amused. “Since then, Phil’s been collecting all of Steve’s memorabilia.”

That's a funny thing about people, about the lengths they will go to impress their heroes, Loki thinks as Coulson smiles up at Steve, as Coulson keeps on trying to engage Steve in conversation and Steve looking mostly uncomfortable as Coulson starts talking about collectible trading cards. It’s almost pathetic, and Loki feels a sense of pity and a sympathy for the blustering man. Loki’s not really in a position to judge, he’s felt the same way about Thor.

"Phil-" Steve's saying, but Tony quickly cuts him off.

"I thought his name was Agent," Tony says, wagging his eyebrows at Coulson. "Alright, Agent. Listen up. Bruce and I are going to. Save. The. World."

Coulson’s mind blue eyes turn towards Bruce and Tony explain in uncertain terms their proposed solution. If it sounded surreal to Loki in the dim bar, it sounds almost comical now, surrounded by bright, fluorescent lighting. By the end of it, Loki's pretty sure they're crazy.

Coulson seems to agree. But he nods anyways.  “I’ll try to get you an audience with Commander Fury,”

Bucky yawns.

-

A week later, the bells start ringing halfway during dinnertime and the atmosphere instantly changes. The pilots slowly rise from their seats, Thor and Loki standing up with trepidation, Natasha Steve, and Bucky striding over to them with a grin. Loki looks over at Thor who looks pale and drawn. This is his first battle in five years; Loki remembers and gives his hand a reassuring squeeze.

Bucky's hand is in a sling from one of the fights last week, broken by a kaiju.

(He had grimaced when he saw Loki looking at him.

"Well some of us actually have pilot," he said, before Natasha led him away, an apologetic expression on her face. "We can't all destroy compounds with our Jaegars, Lucky!" he hollered.)

News of their 'accident,' has spread across the Shatterdom like wildfire, the workers and soldiers all giving Loki a wide berth as he walks down the halls. It is unnerving to say the least.

"They're afraid for their lives," Bruce tells him not unkindly. "Had they not disconnected the wires a second later, there would be no compound left. I understand it wasn’t your fault,"

It does not make him feel any better, but he knows that Thor's feeling even worse. The blonde has stopped showing up in the mess halls, his diet consisting of the apples and bread that Loki leaves at his door. In training he's almost brutal, and during the times Loki sees him, the blonde’s lost weight.

There's a lot of tension riding on this battle. First battles are the most difficult, the stakes high for Loki as he's the rookie, but it's probably even higher than Thor.

If they could win. Thor barely looks like he’s holding himself together, and Loki’s no better.

Loki and Thor change into their red suits wordlessly and head for the briefing room.

Bucky and Natasha are in matching black suits, the insignia of Russia's Winter Widow, a red hourglass and a star, crimson red against the black.

Natasha is whispering something to Bucky in rapid fire Russian, and Bucky looks furious. They both freeze when Loki and Thor pass, and Bucky crosses his arms, eyes fixated on the two.

Clint Barton’s in black, holding a visor that’s a rather violent shade of eggplant, looks straight ahead without acknowledging them, but his copilot, Kate Bishop offers them a sympathetic smile.

“It could happen to anybody.” She says, catching Loki’s eye before heading over to Billy and Teddy, both rookies.

Teddy looks a smidge green.

Only Steve Rogers and Peggy Carter look truly happy to see them.

Finally Colonel Heimdall arrives, hands tucked behind his back.

“Steve and Peggy, you take on the right front with Agent Nomad.  Billy and Teddy, you form the left flank with Young Avenger. Clint and Kate, the two of you take backup. Bucky, Natasha on standby." He finishes, looking at Bucky's right arm.

Bucky and Natasha just nods, but they don’t look particularly pleased.

“What about us?” Thor suddenly asks.

Heimdall’s expression is unreadable. “The two of you can wait."

-

(After that that visit, Thor never went back. It angered Loki to no end, how his other classmates' families would arrive but he would end up sitting by himself because Frigga and Odin had to fight, and Thor wouldn't ever show up.

One day however, he received a visitor.

The man was heavily scarred with large muscles and curling brown hair. He smiled as Loki entered. It wasn’t a particularly attractive smile. "Hey kid. My name's Wade Wilson, and I'm a friend of your brother's."

Maybe it was because Loki was still staring at him in shock, that Wade laughed. "Thor, not the princess’."

"W-what are you doing here?"

Wade threw himself at Loki, who dodged, leaping back with a start. The man never stopped talking.

"Nice reflexes kid. But you're gonna have to do better. And I'm here to teach you how to fight. Not the prissy kind you learn, the actual kind. A bar fight. The kind that helps you survive. Bit of a favor to your big brother, damn the Odinson genes must have passed you, or something huh? They're all built like brick shithouses. And then there's you. Scrawny little thing, but that’s not bad. You’re nubile. We can work with that." he grinned down at the brunet, white teeth baring a grin.

"Let's get started." He finished, as Loki gritted his teeth and threw a punch at him.)

-

“We didn’t do that badly," Loki confides to a dejected Thor, as they’re standing in the control room. Natasha and Bucky have already left already. “It’s different now, we don’t have the jaegars and crews to send every jaegar into every fight.”

“It’s my fault,” Thor says like a broken record, as they watch the other jaegars being deployed. “This was my fault. You know, that night, when we engaged the Kaiju, Balder had told me to follow orders, but I didn’t listen. There was a fishing boat, and I wanted to save them. I deviated from the plan, and Balder didn’t like it but he went along with it because I think he was trying to teach me a lesson, that I was too stupid to understand. And now he’s dead. That should have been me."

“Don’t say that,” Loki replies back maybe a little too fiercely, “Don’t you dare say that.” Their faces are so close, and Loki could just reach a little bit further, and breach the space between them. To kiss Thor.

Thor suddenly turns away. “You know the phrase given to Jaegar pilots who gets lost in their memories?”

“Chasing the rabbit?” Loki replies cheekily. “I think it works. You even look like Alice, with that long blonde hair and baby blue eyes. Come on, let’s get out of here”

Thor sticks his tongue out at Loki. It’s childish, but it makes him smile as they start walking in an almost companionable silence.

They take the roundabout way, passing their Jaegar, Mjolnir Frost.

“It’s good as new,” Thor says in an awed voice as the final touches are being finished. It's got a new silver armor double layer, and red decals. It’s beautiful.

Loki’s about to open his mouth, to tell him that it’s better than new when the intercom clicks on.

“Mjolnir to the Shatterdom.”

-

(Loki was sixteen when he watched Balder’s death on television.

There was a Category Four Kaiju, description Skadi that had attacked the coast. When Loki had turned on the television screen, the Kaiju had already torn apart the left side completely, his jaws tearing into metal like it was nothing more than foam, its law gnashing with the sound of broken metal, pieces of metal sinking in the water.

Loki stared at the screen in shock, as a tiny figure’s plucked out of the cockpit.

Balder.

And if that wasn’t bad enough, the jaegar was still fighting, it was only Thor now. The blonde was still fighting even as pieces of metal began to fall down like rain. Even after the kaiju was defeated, the Jaegar still pounded at it with its fists as if it could bring Balder back.

And finally as Jaegar slumped into the water, Loki turned the television off.

His heart was racing as he used up all his allowance money to buy a train ticket to the coast.)

-

Loki’s falling.

_Initiating Neural Sequence._

_Three._

Loki takes a deep breath.

_Two._

_One._

His mind explodes in a whirlwind of colors. As memories flashes by, he remembers with a start that Thor has wanted to kiss him a minute ago.

Oh. He doesn’t have time to dwell upon it right now.

_Neural bridge established. Pilots fully synchronized._

_Targets are category four Kaiju. Description: Nal and Farbauti. Clear to engage. Good luck._

The moment they get into the water, Loki knows why they have been sent out. After the death of Balder, there hadn't been enough funding to build a new Jaegar. Mjolnir Frost was salvaged, the left side rebuilt, but it led the right side power source and communication signals intact. Mjolnir Frost is the only one remaining of the Class-3 Jaegars which were analog. Nuclear powered.

Loki remembers one of his professors mentioning how the later Catagories switched to digital. He’s not too sure about this,  but it's the only explanation he has.

Neither Young Avenger nor Hawkeye Arrow are moving, dark giants in the water and Agent Nomad is nowhere to be seen. Helicopters hover anxiously overhead, as the a Kaiju prowls through the waters as they move closer to the city.

Tony had said it was going be a double attack.

 _No show?_  He can hear Thor asking in his mind. There's an edge of confidence that hasn't been there before.

Their helmets allow them a clear, panorama view, and Loki is grateful for the new visor that gives them a 360 range of vision.

They raise their jaegar’s fists to bring it down hard on the Kaiju's head.

It is already bleeding, reptilian eyes fixes its attention on Mjolnir, allowing the pilots of Avenger and Hawkeye to escape.

As the Kaiju starts moving again, Mjolnir Frost rights itself in the water, its limb already powering up, sending a surge of blue-white light at the Kaiju but it barely grazes the creature's shoulders.

_Stay on point, Thor._

_I’m trying._

The jaegar punches the Kaiju in the stomach, sending vibrations across their system, and as the Kaiju stumbles, Mjolnir Frost helps it by throwing it over back into the water.

The Kaiju is already down, and Thor loads up the blast and shoots, a streak of white lightning hitting the Kaiju squarely on the stomach.

_Let’s make sure one more time, hm?_

This is the brother that’s he’s missed, the warm reassuring presence that he has grown up with and he recalls Thor’s conversation, a flash of memory.

_\- “Being in a jaegar’s like…you know, there's things that you can't fight. Acts of god or whatever. Like you see a hurricane coming, you just have to get out of the way, you know? But when you're in a Jaeger, suddenly you can fight the hurricane - and you can win.”_

But Loki has to disagree. Being in a jaegar, all that power and adrenalin rush, was like being a hurricane. Being a god. And he’s starting to see why Thor loves it so much.

_See, I told you it was all worth it._

He suddenly remembers that Thor's in his mind. He wants to blush.

_Oh, shut up, you._

The Kaiju goes flying and Loki could feel the adrenalin replacing the grief and uncertainty that has weighed Thor down like wet clothes for the last few days.

There was a feeling of lightness and freeness, and Loki feels like laughing.

_Kaiju down._

_Loki, nine o’ clock._ Thor’s voice rings out, and Loki spins around to spot the second kijue’s tail crash against the side of Mjolnir, sending them sprawling backwards into the city. The neural connection is breaking apart, a white holt jolt of pain racing through Loki’s brain like a flash of lightning, and he braces for impact.

They reconnect again.

As Mjolnir hits a building, Thor’s voice frantically runs through his head.

_Are you alright, brother?_

_I’m fine. We don’t have to pay for repairs, do we?_

A chuckle.  _Nice to see you’re still with us._

Loki checks the engine control, the attack hadn’t hurt them badly, nothing they couldn’t handle. Mjolnir Frost rises up again, and prepares for the next onslaught, sparks flying off their engines.

As the kijue’s spiked tail comes towards them again, they were ready. Mjolnir Frost evades, spinning on its left side -

_Now!_

\- and then Thor shoots another blast of blue at the underside of the kijue’s tail, sending its tail flying off.

_Ew, Thor. Hasn’t mother ever taught you any manners?_

_A man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do, little bro._

The kijue’s tail is bleeding profusely, fluorescent blood dribbling down the streets. It would take too long for the kijue to bleed out.

_Some of us do battle, others do tricks._

_That trick as I recall saved our lives._

_I’m not doubting your usefulness brother._

The Kaiju surges forward but Mjolnir Frost’s ready for it, its arm punching the Kaiju on the nose. The Kaiju’s howls shatter several windows

Mjolnir Frost attacks again, sending the Kaiju reeling backwards, back into the waters, swings right hand to slam the charging Kaiju aside, tumescent clouds of smoke billows from its guns.

However that turns out to be a grave mistake as the Kaiju’s claws drag Mjolnir Frost into the waters below. Loki couldn’t see a thing outside, however their systems oxygen tank is running out.

It’s getting harder to breath.

_Is there anyway we can shake it off?_

_Wait._

Loki presses a button, as the atmosphere suddenly becomes chilly. There’s a blast of cold air as the Kaiju lets go with a shriek, frost coating its appendages.

 _I've never see that before,_  Thor's voice is awed.

_Just something Tony and I’ve been worked on while you were building that stupid wall._

The ice gradually spreads, but they've no time to watch. Thor powers up the blaster again, and shoots.

 There is a tremendous howl from the Kaiju as the screens around them begin to darken.

The jaegar surfaces with the last amount of energy it possesses, and Loki climbs the tube leading outside and unscrews the lid. He and Thor sit on the head of the jaegar, breathing in the cool, sweet night air.

“You were in my mind,” Loki says, incredulous. He’s heard that after a brush with death, everything looks beautiful and he’s inclined to agree, however for completely different reasons.

Everything's bright and lovely, the calm waters lapping against the Jaegar.

There’s a certainty bubbling up inside of him, and he feels light.

"You were always in my mind, Loki" Thor says, reaching out to run his fingers through Loki's hair, and Loki closes his eyes and leans into Thor's touch. He's never been so relaxed, as if the years of tension and fear have ebbed away like waves.

He cracks open his eyes, going suddenly very red and very still.

Thor looks at him expectantly, and Loki remembers something from Thor’s memories.

Thor's in love with him.

And he had been terrified too. And Balder had been disgusted after he  found out through the Drift, forbidding the blonde to visit with the leverage of Thor being kicked out of the Jaegar program. And Thor had wanted to fight and hasn't wanted Loki to know, because of the invariable disgust -

Oh.

 In the distance, helicopters are already sailing towards them, the first four with STARK logos. Stark Corporations got first dibs on Kaiju remains, for both research as well as profit. There is a market for kijue bone soup, considered a delicacy in Northern China, and in the Kaiju’s blood, there is a certain protein that Amadeus Cho swears will be the cure all for all the vaccines in the future.

But Loki doesn’t dwell upon that as Thor’s smiling nervously at at him. The Drift is a two way street, and Thor must have seen Loki's memories too. He must have seen the years of pining, as Loki has felt the years of guilt and uncertainty.

"Why didn't I -"

Everything's starting to make sense now. Thor didn't want to be pilots with Loki because he was afraid of Loki finding out. Of Loki rejecting him.

Oh. He wants to laugh.

 He breathes in. "We won,"

“Did you truly believe otherwise?” Thor asks, sure and confident, he’s no longer talking about their victory, eyes very blue, his grin wide as Loki kisses him feverishly on his salt stained lips, and it feels like a victory anthem.

-

(On the day before Balder’s death, he had visited Loki's school.

Loki had just turned sixteen, awkward and gangly after his growth spurt. None of his clothes fit anymore.

He had interrupted the class during a discussion about the Drift sequence. The Drift, the teacher, a Ms. Pryde had explained, was less about science and more about emotions. Relationships. Being a Jaegar pilot wasn't about who could throw the hardest, but who had the strongest emotional bond.

Loki had wanted to disagree. This was before he had actually been inside a drift; he’s read about it and saw nothing of interest. It was a scientific art, he had wanted to argue, it was just a step to rearrange the neurological bonds so that the Jaegar could think. It was simple, the left hand pilot controlling the left side, the right controlling the right.

As he opened his mouth to speak, the door opened and Balder Odinson appeared at the doorway, unintentionally handsome in his uniform. "Must have stumbled in the wrong room," Balder said, his perfect lips breaking into a winning smile.

Ms. Pryde looks at him once-over. "Do come in," she said.

Immediately, the room erupted into pandemonium.

"Was it true that you and Thor singlehandedly defeated the Kaiju, Thrym?" Kelda asked from the back.

Balder turned his attention to the girl who started blushing furiously. "If it was Thor and I, I would hardly call that singlehanded, wouldn't you say?"

Loki frowned, crossing his arms. He knew the real reason why Balder had arrived. He had sent several letters to Thor, explaining his reasons to switch over to Engineer and Design. Thor had never replied back once, and on the day before his conference with Heimdall, Loki reasoned angrily, the blonde lummox must had sent Balder to dissolute him.

He swore he wasn't going to listen to a word.

"Ms. Pryde, can I steal my brother for a moment?" Balder asked, and when Ms. Pryde's eyes roams across the classroom, Loki turned away.

"Loki," Balder called, and Loki sighed, stuffing his books and papers into his bag. Mrs. Pryde nodded once at him and he stood up, facing his eldest brother like a lamb to the slaughter.

When they got outside, Balder clears his voice. There was a deep expression of disappointment on his face as he turned his hazel eyes onto Loki.

"Where's Thor?" Loki demanded, indignant.

Balder didn't give any indication that he was listening. "I received your letters. Don't worry, father doesn't know yet. But if he does, you know it would break his heart. And Mother's too."

"I don't want to talk to you," Loki retorted. "Where's Thor? Why isn't he here?"

Balder sighed, running a hand through his honey colored locks. There was a strange expression on his face. "Thor doesn't know either. He's be hurt most of all. You know just last month, he was talking to me about one of that group of Chinese pilots. Triplets, I'm sure. Something called the Crimson Hurricane. The Vermillion Typoon. We met one of the pilots – Jubilation Lee or something. Whatever. He thought that maybe after you graduated, we could put in a petition for something like that. He was so excited. But it wouldn't matter, if you know – " He waved it off. "The point is, Thor would be the most disappointed of them all. You don't want to disappoint Thor, do you?"

"I guess not," Loki groused.

"Good," Balder smiled, like everything's settled. "Now that's not the only reason I'm here, I've been told you've been picking fights with the other students."

Loki shrugged, looking surly. "Maybe you should get your facts right before accusing me of anything. And I don’t pick fights.”

“So they attacked you. All twelve times? Why didn’t you tell anybody? A teacher?” Balder continued his voice a harsh reprimand.

“I could handle it,” Loki glared. “Who was I supposed to tell? You? Thor? My teachers? Everybody calls me a coward already anyways. I bet you’ve never had to deal with all this when you were in the Academy, it’s different for somebody whose not completely made of muscles.”

Just talking about it made him furious. Last night, practice with Wade Wilson had gone terribly. He had dodged the man’s punches for about an hour until he grew tired, had been taunted relentlessly until he had finally snapped, fingers pulling on the man’s hair, and kicking him in the balls if only so Wade Wilson would leave him alone.

It wasn’t impressive at all, but the man had seemed oddly impressed, turning to go and leaving Loki to fume.

"If I told anybody, I'd be a victim as well as a coward, and we can't have that can we? What would father say?" He mocked. "What would Thor say? Oh wait, they wouldn't be able to say anything, because I'll be in a hospital. At least if I joined the engineers, I won't ship out in a body bag."

Balder looked at him for a long time. "There are times to pick your battles," he said.

He doesn’t pick his battles. They pick him, and all he could do is run, no matter what Thor said.

A blonde haired woman stood in the doorway. "Mr. Odinson," she said turning towards Balder. "Our flight leaves in five minutes,"

He turned towards the blonde. "Of course, Ms. Denvers."

"Stay out of trouble," Balder said, patting Loki's head. "And remember what I told you,"

"Don't be a disappointment," Loki spat.

A few minutes later, Balder returned. He had left his jacket back with Loki, and as he shrugged on his jacket, Loki turned towards him.

"What's the Drift like?"

There's something in Balder's expression that looks haunted, that looks like pity. "Don't go into somebody's head, if you're not prepared to see inside of it."

He turned to go, and Loki couldn't resist.

"Don't come back.")

-

They come back to tremendous applause, bottles of beer shoved their way. There's even a couple of cakes in the mess hall and a few bottles of champagne.

Teddy Altman walks over grinning at the two of them, holding two glasses of champagne clinking softly against each other. "Colonel Heimdall wants all of us to debrief, but Billy and I'll cover for you." He looks awkward for a moment.

"Are you even old enough to drink?" Thor asks ever responsible, and Teddy shrugs.

"I'm turning twenty one in a week,”

Thor still doesn't look convinced.

"Thanks." Teddy adds hastily, as he runs back towards Billy, the liquid sloshing onto the ground in his haste.

Thor turns to Loki who just smirks, raising his own beer bottle.

"I want to debrief you," Loki whispers, before realizing what he had just said. Thor laughed.

Thor plucks the bottle from Loki’s hand. "You naughty  little thing."

Loki drags Thor over to the exit, and Thor presses him against the wall, kissing him. "You have no idea how much I've wanted to do that," Thor confesses, punch drunk and Loki just shuts him up with another kiss, his tongue sliding into Thor's mouth experimentally.

"We should probably get out of here," Loki says, breaking away. "My room's closer."

Thor grins, gorgeous in the bright light. "Our rooms are facing each other, Loki."

"Yeah, but I've got lotion in mine."

And Thor's grinning and he's laughing, as they make a beeline for Loki's bedroom.

"You should smile more, brother." Thor says, halfway between kisses. "It's a good look on you,"

And when they finally push open the door, Thor pushes Loki onto the bed and Loki pulls off Thor’s shirt entirely, and slides his hand into the drawstring of Thor’s pants, stroking and watches the expression on Thor’s face, the stress and worry slipping away as Thor moans, rutting into Loki’s hand.

“We’re going to make such a mess,” Loki says, as Thor tugs his hand away.

Thor hums. “That we are,”

Loki tugs off his own shirt and pants until he’s sprawled out on bed without a stitch of clothing on, and Thor looks at him with reverence. It's a strange feeling being looked at and touched as if he's something special and wonderful.

Thor's hands are light as he places kisses down the length of Loki’s body, taking him in his mouth and Loki’s already hard. “Oh won’t you hurry up already,” Loki whines because he’s young and because he hasn’t been touched and Thor is infuriatingly slow, and Loki’s falling apart, he’s whining and pleading and he’s coming, and then Thor ricochets back up again, leaving him soft and pliant.

And Thor's kissing him again with Loki's come in his mouth.

Loki hasn’t realized it yet but he’s been holding his breath.

There’s no lube in the room so Thor wets his fingers with the come that's still leaking profusely out of Loki, who shudders the moment Thor places his two against his hole, and enters slowly.

Thor doesn’t want to hurt him, but Loki buckles anyways. Thor turns to him in concern. “Is this alright?” He said, sounding unsure.

Loki grasps Thor’s wrist. “This is perfect,” he says, gasping with pleasure, guiding Thor’s hand further in.

Thor inserts another finger, and Loki’s breathing becomes harsh at the other intrusion but it feels good, it feels perfect in fact.

And Thor’s kissing him now slow and sweet, his fingers setting a rhythm, opening Loki up, touching that nerve bundle that shoots pleasure through Loki's body until he could barely think anymore.

And when Thor adds in a third finger, Loki’s back arches as he begins to move in sync, fucking himself on Thor’s fingers his mouth still tangled on Thor’s, muffling his moans with his lips.

And when Loki’s wet and dripping and open again, Thor withdraws his fingers leaving a sudden emptiness in its wake.

“Can you just – ugh, fuck.”

The lotion bottle's too far away, so Thor slicks himself with his own precum, he’s flushed and hard and leaking and suddenly looking unsure of himself.

“Fuck – you just….ahhhh, push it in. Don’t worry, you won’t hurt me – just....” And Loki’s babbling incoherently, as Thor slowly pushes in.

He's maddening slow, and it's driving Loki crazy.

When Thor's finally buried to the hilt, he rocks experimentally. It's different than Loki imagines it, it is fuller and Loki reaches up to kiss him again.

“Are you alright?” Thor murmurs and Loki nods, the encouragement Thor needs to increase the rhythm, and Loki’s babbling a string of words he’s not even sure he’s saying and the pace becomes even more frantic, it’s infinitely sweet and Loki feels like he’s on the edge of a precipice, and suddenly he’s falling, grasping Thor’s shoulders to steady himself as his mind goes white as Thor comes.

He’s still leaking when Thor pulls him close, and he curls up next to his brother and closes his eyes, listening to the sound of his brother’s breathing and the outside falling rain.

-

(The incident with Sif's hair had started out as a misunderstanding, and had ended up with Loki in the nurses office getting stitches for his mouth.

Every year, one recruit per class was given leave to shadow one of the pilots, and this year it was Sif. Theoric had stood in the back whining about nepotism until Loki kicked him in the knees.

When Sif came back, as always there were rumors, and the key rumor was that she had slept with one of the pilots. It wasn't true, but everybody believed it, including Loki.

It hadn't bothered him until he learned that the pilot Sif shadowed had been Thor, and until he had discovered a watch that Frigga had given Thor hanging from Sif's wrist.

Later, Loki discovered he had been mistaken. The hands on Sif's watch was black, Thor's was gold.

But that night he had snuck into Sif's bedroom and cut the long blonde hair that she had been so proud of, until blonde locks littered the floor and her hair was as short as his. He had been jealous, angry and he had only felt vindicated the next morning, during training as everyone's head turned to look at Sif, hair short and inky black in the exact style of Loki's.

"You like it?" She had asked the other brunet before challenging him to a spar. "I needed a change,"

He never told Thor of this incident and neither had Sif. But after that spar which had ended up with Sif throwing her staff down and punching him so hard that Loki nearly bit through his tongue, they never sparred together again.)

-

Loki’s never been a heavy sleeper and he wakes to the sound of a torrential storm. He could see a flash of lightning through the open window, a rumble of thunder in the distance.

Thor's sleeping beside him, as hot as a furnace, arm draped proprietarily over Loki's stomach.

Loki untangles himself, standing up to go use the restroom.

He catches a glimpse of himself in the mirror. His hair is sleep rumpled and gel free, curly locks falling to his shoulders.

There’s a pair of scissors by the countertop, and he reaches for them wordlessly. He’s not sure what he feels, the bubble of joy blossoming up in his chest suddenly gone.

(After their second bout of lovemaking, Loki had been playing with Thor's hair when Thor opens his mouth.

"Was this your first time?"

Loki had nodded, but that wasn't strictly true.

The question came a little bit later. "Did I make it good for you?"

Loki merely leaned down to press a kiss against Thor's cheek, warm and plait. "Of course.")

Thor is always making things complicated. It just isn't fair. Loki looks at himself in the mirror again, wondering when he started feeling sorry for himself, the pair of scissors still in his hands.

He brings the scissors to his hair.

 Snip. Snip. Snip.

Dark locks begin falling onto the ground, and after he’s done, he stares at himself again in the mirror, his hair shorter now, curling at his ears.

He feels much lighter, freer almost and a little bit happier too. Because that’s the truth. Things are more complicated but he’s happier. He's happier with Thor. 

He looks affectionately at the blonde lying on the bed, mouth slightly ajar and a wave of affection overtakes him. He leaves for the shower to clean himself up, but not before pulling the blankets over his brother.

It wouldn’t do for Thor to get pneumonia, he thinks fondly.

When he returns from his shower, clad in only a towel, wet hair trailing rivulets down his back, Thor couldn't help but stare.

"Do you like it?" Loki asks. "I needed a change,"

And as Thor pulls him back onto the bed, his mouth kissing the juncture of Loki's neck, nothing except Thor matters anymore.

They fall asleep to the sound of the falling rain.

-

(It was a week after the world has learned of Mjolnir Frost's doom when news of other deaths spread. After the Odinsons’ failure, the Kaiju had destroyed several buildings, and there had been twenty five deaths - Theoric’s father, Hermod, among them.

Theoric's fist collided with Loki's cheek, sending the younger boy reeling. "Your brother was a fucking idiot," Theoric hissed into Loki’s ears.

Loki had righted himself back up, spluttering blood across the linoleum. He rammed his head against Theoric's chest. Theoric yelled, and his hair and slammed him against the wall. Theoric was stronger, but he hasn't trained with Wade Wilson.

Loki kicked him hard in the groin, and Theoric screamed again, as he stumbled. There was a look of surprise on Theoric’s face, he hadn’t expected any of this and it was almost easy as Loki helped him fall, pressing his foot onto Theoric’s larynx.

The blonde boy’s head collided against the floor, and he looked up into the coldest pair of green eyes he'll ever see. Distantly Loki realized that he'd been crying, his eyes red rimmed.

 "If you call my brother an idiot one last time -" Loki was panting now.  "-I'll kill you."

He was suspended from the Academy for two weeks. Theoric never bothered him again.)

-

It's a few days later.

They've just fought a category-3 class kaiju, and Loki is starving.

Jaegar pilots keep odd hours so the kitchen's always open to them, and after Loki sneaks back with several apples for himself and three sandwiches for Thor, Loki catches Thor with a curious expression on his face.

“Brother," It was Thor’s customary greeting, familiarity and love in his tone.

“Hm?” Loki replies, biting into the apple with a sharp crunch.

"Are there still barriers in your mind?"

Loki's caught off guard, a piece dislodges in his throat and he starts coughing. Thor pats his back, until the piece of apple falls out. He’s always looking out for his little brother, Loki thinks to himself as Thor’s bright, blue eyes meet his.

“There's still something that you’re not showing me.” It's not a question this time, it's a statement.

Loki fights to keep his voice calm. “What do you mean?”

“When you were sixteen. There’s about six months of time missing from your mind. Coincidentally the six months after Balder's death, my first six months missing."

“How do you know?”

“Each second equals about a month. And the memories flow in a certain order, a memory from the present, and then the past and then a memory from the present again. Memories we share come faster than the memories from when we're apart so they generally come first."

Loki shakes his head. He looks back at Thor calmly, but he feels like all the air's been sucked out of the room.

"I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He says, crawling back into the bed, and kissing the blonde on the cheek.

Thor brushes away Loki’s segue, his expression earnest.

“You know, Balder's and my funeral. What happened during that month? And the months after that?"

“Oh Thor," Loki says, laughing coldly. "Such sentiment. You wanted to see me mourning for you, is that it?"

"Did you mourn?" Thor asks.

Loki shrugs. "We all did. Even though I knew you were alive. Mother was desolate and father was angry. There would be long stretches of time before I'd see either of them. And then one day, Mother and Father fought two kijues simultaneously off the coast, and there were no casualties. Everyone thought there were no casualties, until they found the cockpit empty.” Loki’s voice is bitter.

"They blamed themselves of course for you and Balder, and then I took care of myself. Is that what you wanted to see?"

Thor looks shaken.

Loki just continues in the same hollow tone. “Their funeral was grand. Everybody showed up, but you. And Balder, obviously who couldn’t make it.” Loki forces himself to continue talking, in a horribly calm voice. “They asked me how I was holding up. I told them fine, as fine as I can be after my brothers’ deaths.”

“I’m sorry,” Thor says.

Loki sighs. “Our parents died thinking that they had lost both their elder sons. I don't see why that matters so much to you. Maybe I didn't want to remember because it hurts. Maybe I didn't want to remember because I didn't want to think about losing you. Let’s go back to bed. I'm tired Thor."

And Thor just dutifully climbs into bed with him, brushing an apologetic kiss on his lips.

Loki leans into the embrace.

"I'm sorry I brought that up," Thor says tiredly, and there's something in his face, full of trust and love that makes Loki shaky in his knees.

"It doesn't matter. Don't apologize for stupid past mistakes."

As the first rays of morning drifts through the window, Thor's already asleep, snoring lightly, he's rolled over onto his stomach sometime during the night. His body is a warm, solid presence. Comforting. Loki stares upwards at the ceiling, hand resting on the curve of Thor's lower back.

Suddenly Thor's doesn't feel comforting, but rather confining. It is true that he didn't want to relive these memories because reliving them would bring back the pain anew. But that's not the only reason.

There's a certain memory he's locked away inside his mind, the memory of the night after Balder's death. That even he had had forgotten about. Almost.

And sooner or later, Loki knows, Thor'll make that connection.

And he's not going to love Loki anymore.

 -

(The first time Thor and Loki fucked was after their victory over two Kaijus. They had rescued four pilots and proved to the world that they were a force to be reckoned with and Loki had realized that his brother was in love with him.

No. The first part of that statement was a lie.

No, the first time they fucked, they actually fucked, was actually the night after Balder’s death.

Thor was unrelenting and uncompromising, and Loki had only urged him faster. He wanted to be hurt, to quench the fluttering in his heart. He couldn’t stop loving with Thor, but damnit, he would try.

Back then he was angry at the world and lonely and had believed that his two brothers were dead, and he had stumbled across a bar. Thor had been there, eyes red rimmed and mind clouded with alcohol and he had taken Thor home with him.

And somehow along the way they had started kissing because Loki didn’t know what to do and neither did Thor, they had been both desperate and sad and Thor had been so steady, like a lifeline and the kissing had migrated into something deeper, and Thor had pushed Loki onto his back on the carpet.

Back then, he believed that if he ever gave Thor an inch, Thor would make a mile leaving Loki with absolutely nothing.

And sometime during the night, Thor left.

And that next morning, both of Loki's brothers were dead to him, and he cried along with Frigga as news of Mjolnir Frost's destruction splashed across the headlines of every newspaper.)

-

Thor doesn’t remember a thing about that night, although Loki senses its there. Like a ghost. A phantom. Neural connections are strange, fickle things after all.

He once catches Heimdall staring after him in puzzlement. They've made mistakes, little flashes of disorientation that only somebody who’s piloted a Jaegar would recognize.

The Drift is only fully functional when pilots are being completely open with each other.

Thor's memories leaps from Balder's death to buying a one way ticket to Anchorage, Alaska.

Loki's memories of those six months are left carefully open, and Thor doesn't press the matter.

But it's only a matter of time.

-

(It was the Saturday after when they received the call confirming Balder's and Thor's deaths.

They all had ways to cope with it. Frigga started prowling the coastline in her Jaegar uniform as if searching for her boys, and Odin threw himself into work.

And Loki started hating Thor. Because he left. Because he ran. Even when a long time ago, he had told Loki not to.)

-

They are losing, and there are casualties. After a shift, Loki sees Kate curled up in her room, crying into her hands. Both her legs are broken. Clint doesn’t return that night.

Teddy falls into a coma.

"At least he's still alive," Billy’s been repeating to himself.

They are losing, and one day Tony Stark invites them all to drinks and the atmosphere's more exuberant as he explains proudly how they're going to stop the kaiju attacks once and for all.

There're going to take a nuclear bomb into the portal and blow it all up. Coulson's there too, looking like a grim kindergarten teacher. He's nodding, they're truly that desperate. Loki finds himself agreeing more and more with Tony, the portal idea's starting to make a lot more sense these days. They’re growing desperate.

They are losing. Loki's filled with trepidation every time the Neural Handshake starts, and one day after a fight Loki finds himself crying, and he couldn't quite quite meet Thor's eye.

-

It starts out like the beginning of every other fight.

Loki’s falling.

_Initiating Neural Sequence._

_Three._

Loki takes a deep breath.

_Two._

_One._

The memories are rushing towards him with the force of a speeding train, a collision of memories and unspoken thoughts. Childhood memories flash across Loki's mind like lightning. Loki's young again, picking flowers to give to Frigga, Thor standing next to him and helping him with the thorns. They're adults now, and they're sharing a drink.

They're migrating to the showers, and Thor is kneeling in front of him as the warm spray from the showerhead drenches them both, and it's incredibly erotic, sexual tension hovering in the air like mist.

Their memories are becoming synchronized, and the intimacy of it all is staggering.

Loki knows that Bucky and Natasha have known each other since childhood, ever since Natasha found Bucky living in a cardboard box in Moscow in the middle of winter after his home was destroyed by a Kaiju and invited him in.

Loki knows that Billy and Teddy met at a comic book convention after Teddy spilled coffee onto Billy’s sweater and they bonded over their shared love for mecha anime and comic superheroes.

Loki knows that Clint Barton used to be a carnie and Kate Bishop used to be a socialite, but now they're partners and somehow they just seem to click.

And Loki knows that the other pilots know that he and Thor have something more than brotherly, but they don’t comment upon it because that’s just how things are.

It’s a sense of acceptance outside of friendship that the Jaegar pilots have built up, a rapport that comes from equally shouldering the burden of saving a world that's almost given up. There's something unnatural about two brothers sharing a bed in a way that's painfully unbrotherly, but the other pilots take it in stride, because there's nothing natural about fighting monsters with robots either.

"The two of you remind me of Jaime and Cersei Lannister," Billy has told them yesterday during an off period, and had promptly invited them upstairs to watch Game of Thrones.

Loki disagrees, he's pretty sure he's Tyrion.

Thor's laughing inside his head, bright and clear.

_Neural bridge established. Pilots fully synchronized._

And here is where everything starts going wrong.

The voice inside their headpiece is almost frantic.

_Target is a … is there some kind of mistake? No? Alright. Target is a Category Five Kaiju. Reporting name: Helblindi. Cleared to engage. Good luck._

Silence. A hum of static.

You’ll need it.

Mjolnir Frost takes a single step towards the Kaiju, however something strange happens as the Kaiju roars, its soundwaves shattering layers of glass.

Everything starts going black. There are intervals of light, like he's blinking very fast, aftershocks that are blinding. Something's wrong with the Jaegar. Something's broken, Loki realizes with a start before things start powering up again.

The Kaiju’s larger, much bigger than any they’ve ever seen before and as they maneuver to face the Kaiju, Thor’s face is drawn, their connection static. It feels like they're almost disoriented, and all Loki can feel is the rush of blood in his ears, and a sheer, almost alien abject fear.

There’s something wrong, he couldn’t hear Thor, and in a minute, the Kaiju attacks with claws, their warnings flashing rapidly. Thor! He screams into his head, but all he can hear is himself.

“Status Report,” A frustrated voice calls into his headpiece. “Mjolnir Frost. What happened?” There’s a host of other voices too in the background, some sounded confused, others worried.

Something's gone wrong.

Loki couldn’t hear anything from Thor whose all but slumped to the ground, except he feels waves of pain and fear and terror.

There's a moment of gravity before Loki's pulled down too by the force of the Jaegar.

And suddenly their neural connection is widening, it’s getting harder to hear Thor’s thoughts, Loki can only catch flashes of it; the ocean, of Thor’s desperation in reaching for his brother, of Balder spitting out blood and pulling out a gun, shooting at the Kaiju, Balder’s furious expression after battle, telling Thor that Loki is his brother and only his brother, an absolute expression of disgust on his face.

Of the terror Thor felt as he watched his elder brother being pulled out of the cockpit and thrown into the seething waters below. The terror in his mind, Thor's terror wasn't because he was afraid for himself, but rather for Loki.

And sudden, there’s nothing but static.

 _He's chasing the rabbit._  They’ve a job to do.  _I’m going after him,_  Loki calls into the controller, sounding more confident than he feels and he dives.

He dives into Thor’s memories where there’s just the rush of saltwater, stinging his wounds and the sun bearing down upon him. He’s sitting on the husk of a broken Jaegar, Mjolnir Frost and he could hear noises, sobbing and wrecked in the distance until he realizes they're coming from himself.

He’s so tired, he wants to sleep. He can’t move, everything feels like fire and he howls up at the desolate skies. There's a headache coming on, he's - Thor's - just piloted a Jaegar by himself. He needs to rest. He wants to rest.

Loki closes his eyes, and falls again.

He's in the ocean. A storm is coming.

Their neural connection’s breaking up, but Loki has an idea. It’s not the cleverest idea he’s ever had, but it’s a connection.

Loki’s hanging onto the wreckage of a Jaegar and as the tide’s rising, he lets go.

And Loki’s falling again.

This time they’re at home, back in Odin and Frigga’s house and he’s being supported by a dark haired figure, who he’s in love with, and he’s drunk. Balder’s body hadn’t been found and he wants to die, every muscle of his body wants to stop moving. It'sallmyfault, he thinks, the rush of words all jumbled up. But all he can do is cling onto the figure like a lifeline -

Oh.

Damn. Suddenly he feels wrenched back into his own body, he’s straddling Thor, sixteen and uncertain and he’s pressing his mouth in the juncture of Thor’s throat, and he’s guiding Thor’s cock to his entrance and he’s not prepared and it hurts like hell but he thinks he wants this, he want this.

And even though it hurts, even though it’s brutal it feels good. They both wants this. They're both a little drunk, and both a little sad. His last thought is the fact that Thor's trying his hardest not to hurt him.

He's falling again.

He wakes up. They’re back in the cockpit and Thor’s eyes are looking away, unmoving. It takes a moment to reorganize himself. He breathes in the recycled air of the Jaegar, lets it simmer.

 _Loki, can you hear me._  He hears Thor’s voice in his head, shaken.

 _Yeah, Thor._  Loki replies back.  _Welcome back._

They have nothing else to say, so they get ready to fight.

Loki’s not thinking of anything except for the Kaiju in front of him. He doesn't think of the past because it’s too painful, and he doesn't think of the future, because there’s no future anymore so he focuses on the present.

There’s no thought, no conversation, just their bodies moving in tandem in the center of a hurricane of metal.

And when Thor loads up the blast to deliver the final blow, the cackle of electricity sounds a little bit like a swan song.

And then they’re walking back to shore, back to the Shatterdom and Loki wants to apologize but he’s numb and he’s tired and Thor doesn’t want to see him, there’s a feeling that makes him nauseated, there’s grief, anger, guilt, pounding through his chest.

 _Good job, brother._ Thor’s voice rings in his head, even though Loki feels like they’ve lost.

-

As they unstrap themselves and step out of the cockpit, Thor doesn’t look at Loki at all, he just keeps on walking and Loki falls in step behind him. They’re walking through the corridors and this silent is terrifying, Loki wants Thor to hit him, to yell and scream at him, anything would be better than being coldly ignored.

When they reach Thor’s room, Thor finally turns around. His eyes are red rimmed. There's a tautness in his face.

"Thor," Loki calls out after him, his voice wavering.

Thor doesn't say a word. He stares at Loki if he's just seen a ghost.

He runs.

And perhaps that's the most terrifying thing. The fact that Loki made Thor ran.

-

Mjolnir Frost is in need of repairs. They're not superficial this time. There's a new engine needed, the old one's worn out, its metal oxidized by sea water. They're gonna repair it with a salt water repellant one that Tony Stark invented just last week.

"Just for you, my lucky charm," he had called out to Loki only yesterday. "Say hello to your brother for me, I'd visit him but Bruce and I are going to be kinda busy." And he had winked before disappearing back into the crowd.

Loki finds himself joining Heimdall in surveying the new recruits. They're a new batch, with hopes and dreams and maybe among them, Loki can find a replacement for Thor.

Loki’s tired now, there's a feverish sheen on his skin. He sleeps fitfully, and it shows. There are shadows blooming under his eyes.

He doesn't even watch the spars anymore. The only thing that plays in his mind over and over again is the expression of absolute anguish on Thor’s face.

Heimdall’s speaking to him something about a new pilot. Something about compatibility. They're short on pilots with nearly everybody injured.

 “Sif,” he responds, mechanically. She deserves it, for all the good she'll do for Thor, and all the trouble Loki's put her through. They deserve to be happy.

Heimdall does not look surprised. “You think she’s a good choice?”

Loki smiles at him with all his teeth bared. He feels as cold as the metal that makes up Mjolnir Frost. There's a headache coming on. “Absolutely.”

-

One day, Loki bumps into Sif in the training arena.

She punches him in the face.

It hurts like hell.

He's spluttering, there's blood trailing out of his nose. "What did you do that for?" His lips curl into a snarl.

"You're a damn coward," Sif replies coldly before punching him in the face again. "Go talk to your brother."

He's going to have a black eye soon.

Sif looks at him once over, there's half exasperation and half impatience on her face.

And then she kisses him on his forehead. “Thanks,” she says smiling.

He's staring at her incredulously before realizing. Oh. She just got the news. He's not going to give her the satisfaction of a "you're welcome," He should feel happy for her, but he’s not.

“Heimdall’s going back to pilot a Jaegar, and he said that you recommended me as his partner.” She explains, shrugging. "Don't worry about me stealing your partner. Thor and I aren't exactly compatible anyways. I looked. We're forty two percent compatible."

Loki touches the bruise forming quickly on his cheek. His mouth is still gaping open. Sif just smiles sweetly at him.

"I'm not afraid of you coming after me for revenge. I'm not at the top of your priorities list. You're probably either going to sulk and mope, or you'll go talk to your brother." There's a smile tugging on her face as she continues, "And I've got a vicious right hook."

She turns to go, dark hair swishing behind her. “If you ask me, you should talk to your brother,”

-

Loki leaves Thor a note asking to meet him in the training area early tomorrow morning. He doesn't sign it.

After careful deliberation, he also sets an apple beside it, like a white flag.

-

The next day, Loki is half afraid that Thor wouldn't show up. That he'll be on train to Alaska, and Loki will have lost his brother forever.

It's your fault, a small voice reprimands him harshly. If you hasn't been so stupid, so selfish. Thor loved you, Thor loved you, Thor loved yo, Thor might still love y -

Loki stares at the clock, counting down the seconds. If Thor is going to show up, Thor's already three minutes late. Loki's throat is tight, his heart hammering in his chest.

After nine minutes has passed, the blonde finally emerges, skin sallow in the artificial light. He looks like he hasn't slept in days, maybe he hasn't. They've been fighting Kaijus for the last week, it's a wonder they haven't collapsed from exhaustion yet.

"I don't know how you can even stand to look at me, brother." Thor says, voice devoid of emotion at the same time Loki opens his mouth.

"Thor, for everything I have done, I am so sorry,"

And suddenly Thor breaks. "What are you talking about?" He roars.

Loki flinches visibly.

"What do you have to be sorry about," Thor's voice softens, face morphing into guilt and anguish. "What do you have to be sorry about?"

Loki only looks back in confusion.

Thor seems to be struggling with words. "H-h-how could you even bear to be in my mind after what I have done to you. I remember everything now, it all makes sense, the way you act around me, skittish and afraid."

Loki's mouth goes very dry. "What do you remember, Thor?"

"You!" Thor's shouting now, his voice echoing across the wall, a trail of little 'you's widening the fissures in Loki's heart. He's swept up in a current, he can't breath, the water's rising.

Loki would laugh if he didn't feel so much like crying.

"The night after Balder's death. The I didn't want to to home. You were leading me home, but then something happened and you were in my bed and...and...oh god," Thor's eyes squeezes shut, he looks like a man facing the gallows. "I raped my younger brother."

"No, Thor." Loki says, and he's no longer drowning, rather he's in free fall. There's two outcomes, neither one preferable but he needs to be honest now, he owes that to Thor. There's a certain intimacy between co-pilots, a certain sacrosanct honesty that they rely on, it comes from sharing and navigating the other's innermost dreams, hopes and thoughts. Thor's been nothing but honest with him, he owes Thor the same right.

Thor's going to leave, he knows that. It's the only thing he can expect, but at least Thor would leave with a peace of mind. No, that's not right. Thor would leave, Thor would be brotherless and but he'll survive.

Staring into Thor's wide, honest eyes Loki knows now, the real reason he had ran away to Alaska. Maybe even subconsciously why he didn't want to pilot with Loki.

"No, you didn't." Loki repeats in a voice full of conviction, trying hard not to cry, "You never came home after leaving, and it was my fault, you were so busy and I was in love with you, and I didn't want to be."

There's a pain in his chest, he's falling now and the ground's rising up, and he doesn't think he'll be able to survive the impact.

"So I kissed you,"

Thor's silent, waiting.

The pain is fresh, raw but Loki continues, because he has to. He's not going to get another chance. "And you kissed back, and it felt nice. But that's the problem isn't it? You're so damn kind and perfect, and I'm in love with you but that's the problem. I shouldn't be in love with my older brother, I can't be in love with you because you end up leaving, you always end up leaving me!"

Thor watches him with the same infinite patience that he always has. He's looking at Loki, and something changes, barely perceptible, and Loki's heart hurts because maybe he's seeing Loki for who he actually is.

"You're always leaving me," Loki finishes bitterly. "So I thought that maybe, I dreamt of it and of waking up next to you, if anybody is at fault, it's me. It shouldn't even have happened but I was stupid, and I was in love with you and I didn't want to be. Don't blame yourself, I hate it when you get that expression, like you're to blame for everything bad in the world, like thunderclouds and Kaijus and rain."

"Is it really so bad to be in love with me?" Thor finally asks, ruefully.

The answer's yes. It's terrible being in love with somebody like Thor, whose all about the present, who doesn't think about the next day and who doesn't hold grudges, whose already forgiven Loki, even though he shouldn't. Loki's frozen, his legs are leaden sticks. He should leave, pack up his books. The Shatterdom belongs to Thor, the people there already love Thor who they've known for less than a month more than Loki they've known for years.

It's about letting people in, Loki realizes. But something's are unforgivable, and Thor's already paid five years for his mistake. Loki's mistake is infinitely worst, he'll figure something out, some sort of atonement that won't make things worst. Loki has a habit of screwing up the good things in his life, Thor's a prime example of that.

Loki wants to run away from Thor, Loki wants to run to Thor, Loki wants to run somewhere far far away and hide himself in some crevasse somewhere until Thor forgets that he even had a brother.

Thor's still waiting for his answer.

Loki only shakes his head, walking silently over to the weapons stand and pulls out two bo staffs with a certainty that Loki does not feel. It’s a segue, and when Thor accepts it, Loki's more than a little grateful.

-

There's no longer a crowd around them, they can fight as desperately as they please. There's something raw and brittle, and Loki knows that Thor can hurt him very badly. But he also knows that Thor won't. There's a small comfort in that.

 

Loki's the one whose supposed to be good at words, but with Thor things get muddled, he says too much, he says not enough. It's a terrifying thing, he thinks, being in love.

Thor speaks with actions, and Loki's still not sure what Thor's feeling. He's normally good at reading people, it's what makes him such a good liar, but Thor keeps him guessing and honest.

Thor attacks first. Loki shifts into an defensive stance, his staff sweeping up in a arc to meet Thor's. Thor mouth is a thin line, he's putting his strength into it.

Loki grits his teeth and holds on.

There's no question in who had superior might, so Loki holds on for as long as he can before he hears a horrible cracking sound.

Loki's staff shatters with a horrible, splintering sound and Loki tosses it, his fist curling into a fist.

Thor blocks Loki's hit with his forearm. Thor’s not smiling, and neither is Loki, they’re both tension wound. Thor moves like he's dancing,  he’s passionate and fighting comes naturally;  yet Loki’s holding his own, he’s had years of practice and he’s faster. More careful. He's calm.

The worst of the deluge has passed. He's on solid ground.

It's not a fight nor a spar, but a war; neither side is giving in. It's completely silent, except for the sounds of labored breathing, of bodies making contact, the two of them becoming one.

Loki uses everything he's learned, from back alley fights to his sessions with Wade Wilson, with Colonel Heimdall, with Thor. He knows Thor's weaknesses, and he's not afraid to use them.

"You've got to let go." Thor's voice echoes across the caverns of the training arena, the harsh, unforgiving electric light bearing down upon them, lightening up the angles in Loki's face, the shadows underneath Thor's eyes.

Thor twists Loki’s arm, and Loki falls, he’s sprawled down on the practice mat glaring up at Thor.

“You’ve built so many walls around yourself, and you’re a mistrusting little thing. I only have myself to blame for that, and I know it might be too late for you to let me in, but tell me truly, Loki – ” and here Thor's voice shatters, like the hull of a Jaegar. "- was I ever a good brother to you?"

And Loki wants to tell him no, tell him not really because Loki's never wanted to be brothers with Thor, with Balder. He doesn't want to be part of the family, part of a matched set, he wants to fight on his own terms instead of allow the Odinson family name to dictate who he is and who he's supposed to be.

He doesn't want to be compared to Balder by everybody they meet, to be sized up by curious eyes and know deep down inside, he doesn't compare.

He wants to tell that that he doesn't want to be Thor's brother because Thor's in his mind all the time now, both figuratively and literally, and they're brothers, Thor's fingers shouldn't be up his ass and that Thor shouldn't be moaning his name at night 

And there are lines that even Thor shouldn’t cross.

But there's this thing called a war on, and they fight monsters every day; the lines they use to draw in the sand as children, having been swept away by the waves a long time ago and Loki's learned, that if he is to die, he wants to die in a jaeger with Thor next to him, unshakable and unafraid.

There's a theory, that being in a jaegar makes you braver and stronger, like you can take on hurricanes or acts of god. And win. But Loki's got his own theory, and he thinks his is better.

He doesn't need a jaegar to weather the storm. All he needs is Thor.

And so Loki only stares up at him and takes Thor's hand. And Thor's looking at him, really looking at him.  "As brothers go, you’re alright."

But really, there nothing to say, Thor will be in his mind soon enough again. Loki'll just let his thoughts speak for themselves.

-

Thor’s sitting on the jut overlooking the sea when Loki joins him, two beer bottles in hand. "I'm sorry."

It's quickly becoming the most overused word in his repertoire, but he still can't seem to say it enough.

"For what, this time?” Thor exhales.

He doesn’t turn to look at him.

It’s a quiet morning, the buildings hazy in the fog, the pearly-gray skies threatening rain at every turn.

Loki reaches over, fingertips brushing Thor's shoulder.

Thor turns to look at him. He looks almost normal, blonde hair mussed by the winds, day old stubble on his face. There's an expression on his face, almost like longing.

"You taught me to never run away. You taught me to stand my ground, to fight." He walks closer, smiling shyly. "I'm sorry I ran away,"

"Well there's no need to apologize, Loki. I guess we're both guilty of this." Thor pulls him into an embrace, it feels like absolution.

 

There’s a stillness in the air, a chill that Loki doesn’t recognize. The clouds have cleared, there’s a hint of sun. The world smells sweet, born anew, the rains have finally stopped.

Thor takes both of his beer cans. "You're too young to drink, baby brother." But he's smiling too.

It’s a start.

-

The next day, they’re called to a meeting. Billy and Teddy are standing together, determined and resolute; Natasha, grim faced and serious and Bucky grinning, his right arm no longer in a sling; Heimdall standing next to Sif who looks pale but ready.

Commander Nick Fury walks onto the podium, Agents Phil Coulson and Maria Hill behind him. Through the window, Loki can see sunlight streaming in. The sky outside is so blue, it's almost blinding.

“Today we face the monsters at our door. Today,” Commander Fury starts, his voice, a low rumble. “We are going to cancel the Apocalypse.”

-

_Initiating Neural Handshake._

“Do you remember,” his voice is low, cracked and hazy with memory and static. “what you’d always say to me, when we were younger and the storms were raging outside, and I was so scared?”

_In three._

_Two._

“Hm?” Thor's voice is a low hum.

“You told that you would hunt the monsters down, and slay them all.”

“I did, didn’t I? I guess there’s been a change in plans.”

_One._

_Neural bridge established. Pilots fully synchronized._

_Target Established: Pacific Rim. Ready to engage. Good luck._

Maybe Loki's no longer falling. Maybe Thor catches him.

The last thing Loki catches is Thor’s grin, bright and easy. That’s one of the things that’s never going to change.

They take the plunge.

They’re going to be alright.

 


End file.
